


light of mine

by reddoorandlemontree



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Adorable Dad!Jon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Season 6-8, mention of infertility, mention of miscarriage
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2019-05-07 23:57:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 24,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14682189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reddoorandlemontree/pseuds/reddoorandlemontree
Summary: jon snow had fathered a daughter with ygritte, something he discovers soon after being named lord commander of the night’s watch (so after ygritte’s death). my take on how this would impact jon and the events of the show from late season 5 and onward.





	1. jon

They hid her from him until after he was elected the 998th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch -- his own daughter.

Jon remembers seeing glimpses of the babe for months in the Wildling camps. They set up a small village of their own on the southern side of the Wall upon his approval after the horrors he witnessed at Hardhome. Whenever he passed through, he would see this little light of a girl trying to keep up with the older children’s games, bouncing at a crone’s hip or even with a spearwife. His eyes had always been drawn to her, sometimes even searching her out when she wasn’t in sight because there was _something_ about her that just seemed so oddly familiar.

It all flashes through his mind as Tormund tells him. It is an accident, a slip of words in the aftershock of learning that the last of his people have made it beyond the Wall, but none of them are Tormund's daughter, who had joined the fight.

“My eldest one was there,” he says in a hollow voice, the empty despair in it too harsh of a contrast from the booming laughter and joy Jon has come to know. “At least your’s is safe beyond Castle Black.”

At first, Jon thinks his grief is making him talk nonsense. “What?” he asks, whipping his head around to where his friend sits slumped against the stone wall.

His stark blue eyes shows defeat, like he no longer has the will to care about keeping the secret -- or the will to care about anything at all, really. “She’s Ygritte’s,” he says. “ _Kissed by fire,_ the two of us… not so lucky, is it?”

“Tormund, what are you talking about?” Jon can hear his voice rising but all caution is long gone. _Ygritte_ … Gods, how long has it been since he heard her name? He meets her in his dreams night and night again, different versions of her that are sometimes terrifying and morphed, and sometimes so fiery and real that his heart aches when he wakes.

“Your babe…” he says simply, yet it makes Jon’s pulse falter and quicken. “We knew the bloody crows’d hang ya for it, so we raised her with us in the camps. But you’re Lord Commander now, aren’t ya?”

In the numbing, disbelieving shock of it all, he has no reaction but to run. His eyes begin to sting with tears that leave hot trails on his chilled cheeks and his whole body shakes like a damned leaf in the wind. Though he doesn’t remember how he got there, he ends up spending the night far down the top of the Wall where none of his sworn brothers were, letting the revelation wash over him.

~

Early the next morning, Jon marches straight into the camps and finds the familiar-looking babe sleeping in a little cot in the tent where they house the children whose warrior parents aren’t there to care for them. Without being asked to, the women in the tent silently leave to let him meet his child. Even thinking the words, _his child_ , feels bizarre.

As he gets closer, heart beating in his throat, and sees the steady nose bridge and smattering of freckles he knows from Ygritte, Jon Snow smiles for the first time in what feels like ages.

He waits until she wakes, not quite sure of her temperament.

Never having gotten close enough to see her eyes before, he is startled by how exact they are to his, and though her hair had always been covered by hats to protect from the cold, he discovers it to be identical to his own dark curls.

It is his biggest fear come true, he has brought another bastard named Snow into the world yet he can’t come to regret it, especially not when she smiles up at him like _that_.

He later learns that she is yet to be named. Apparently it is a common belief among the Free Folk that naming a child before their second name day brings bad luck, since so few infants live that long in the harsh conditions.

Her second name day is quickly approaching and so he decides on a name: Aryanna, for his beloved younger sister and his eternally loved aunt whom he never got to meet.

~

In a matter of days, he has fallen hopelessly in love with the child. Even though she is barely two years of age, he can already see that she has her mother’s stroppy, yet endearing, nature. He’s baffled by how quickly she warmed up to him, and by how much she talks at such a young age, though her vocabulary is limited.

Apparently, Aryanna was a very early talker with a snappy attitude and an lovable pull that had even the toughest of giants grow mushy. He didn’t blame them.

Her tantrums are rare, but only because if she wants something, she finds a way to get it. Jon sees this first hand when he sees her push a boy into the snow for taking her sparring stick.

He has to pull her aside and explain that, though the kid was wrong in doing so, she has to learn to share and ask nicely. She only huffs.

The first time Aryanna meets Ghost, she reacts exactly how he expected her too -- yelling nonsense, she runs right at him and grabs his face and screams “puppy!” while Jon looks on and laughs. Not once does he fear that Ghost may harm her. In fact, the wolf’s first reaction is to lick her cheek, to which she erupts into giggles.

In his visits to her, Jon tries to be as discreet as possible. If he had his will, he would house the child by his own Lord’s chambers, keep her safe and warm within the walls of Castle Black, bring her comfort when she wakes from a nightmare, listen to her when she babbles on about whatever children babble on about. Instead, he has to sneak into the tent with some excuse or other and leave hastily to attend to his duties.

Despite his efforts however, some of his brothers seem to sense there is something askew so they look on suspiciously when he enters the camps alone and returns later with a stupid smile he can't seem to hide well.

~

There are nights when all he can think of his how he is failing to meet her needs.

Jon doesn't want his daughter to grow up at the hands of women who pity a motherless child because he knows all too well how that feels. He wants her to know that she was loved by her mother, a strong woman with whom he was in love with despite their differences and the magnitude of them.

He fears she will become distant from him, perhaps even grow to blame him for what happened.

The fear of her not loving him back, however, is dispelled when every time he goes to greet her, Aryanna runs over as fast as her chubby little legs allow, and stretches out her arms to be picked up.

He spins her and ruffles her hair, a messy jumble of raven locks, as she laughs without a care in the world.

It doesn't even take her long to start calling him “Papa” after hearing other children do the same to their fathers, and it's quite possibly the best thing Jon has ever heard. He tried not to cry when she said it the first time, a sleepy mumble as she drifted off.

~

“Lord Commander… it's one of the wildlings you brought, says he knows your Uncle Benjen, says he's still alive,” was what Olly had said.

So it makes no sense to him now when he pushes through the circle of men and finds nothing but a plank of wood with something etched onto it.

It's too late when the word and what it means for him finally registers, because the first knife is already in his gut.

In truth, the physical pain is slight in comparison to the weight of the betrayal he feels.

The one that hurts most is Olly -- Olly who he found scared and alone, who admired him and followed him like a lost pup, but also Olly who let loose the arrow that buried itself into Ygritte’s heart… Gods, it hurt.

“For the watch.”

“For the watch.”

“For the watch.”

And on and on it went until Jon lay helpless in the courtyard, his blood seeping into the snow as he felt his body grow cold.

As his vision begins to blur and darken, he thinks of Aryanna and her laugh and the way she says “Papa” and her bouncy hair with snowflakes in it and prays to any gods that may still be listening that the coward men don't find her.

~

One moment everything is so impossibly void and the next… a flicker here, a fragment of sound there, a burst of sensation rippling across his body anew.

Jon bolts up, gasping, as his lungs burn and ache for air as if they’ve been painfully deprived for days -- and perhaps they have. He doesn’t know how long it has been since or what happened for him to end up on a stone slab without a stitch of clothing and -- why is it so _cold_?

It’s then that he sees the scars splayed over his chest, too fresh and too deep for him to be as alive as he is.

 _No, something is wrong_ , his mind manages through a jumble of chaos, _terribly wrong_.

There is someone at the door, he faintly registers -- Ser Davos -- but that does little to help him work through the tumult of fear and confusion and pain and shock and so much else.

He is all too aware of his heart, all of a sudden, beating against his aching chest like a trapped beast, and, in his disarray, he tries to stand up, though his muscles falter under his weight.

Davos prevents him from hitting the ground, instead wrapping a thin cloak over his shaking form.

Through the fog, Jon recognizes the Red Priestess as she steps closer and seems shocked when he recounts his last memories, the stabbing, Olly, the cold, the dark….

She is questioning him about what he saw, what it all means but his train of thought had led him to Aryanna and suddenly, just as he was beginning to calm somewhat, the fear surfaces again, bubbling in his stomach like acid, and he almost doesn’t want to know.

Still, he asks, voice all raspy and his throat hurting from disuse, “Aryanna… Aryanna is she…?”

Though the old knight has never met his daughter, he seems to understand after a moment of silence. “The child, she is alright. The bloody cowards, they fled when….”

He goes on speaking but Jon is no longer paying attention. She is alright. And for now, that is enough.

“I want to see her,” he finally croaks.

“I’m not sure that’s wise, they’ll know you broke your vows and--”

“I was just _killed_ , Davos, I was _stabbed_ by my own _brothers_! I am no longer tied to any vows, I will see my daughter if I bloody well want to.” He knows the poor old man shouldn’t receive the brunt of his emerging temper but he is in no mood to put up with any of it, to hide this part of his life, this piece of his heart.

Without a word, Davos disappears, leaving Jon alone and shivering until Edd comes in, shocked as the other two were. He hastily snaps out of it and helps his former Lord Commander up to lead him to his chambers so he may fully dress and let the fire in the hearth return the warmth to his hands.

He notices Edd is doing all the duties a steward would usually do, starting a fire, bringing him food, pouring a tall mug of ale, and so he briefly wonders where his own steward is. Olly -- Gods, the boy is so young, likely around the same as Rickon would be now, but he knows it has to be done.

“ _For the watch.”_

Thankfully, Jon’s thoughts are interrupted by a knock at the door, which Edd answers. Ser Davos enters, the solemn mood he left with replaced by a gleeful smile as he holds Aryanna at his hip and her little fingers pulled at the whiskers of his mustache.

Edd, growing more confused by the moment, looks between Jon and the child. Jon can see the cogs turning in his head, comparing the hair and the eyes and the way her face lights up at the sight on him.

“Papa!” she squeals, wriggling in Davos’s arms and reaching out toward him.

When Jon smiles, the muscles in his face feel so stiff, they almost hurt. Still, he manages a chuckle and brings her to his chest, holding her tight because he would not have been able to live with himself if the lot that had stabbed him had found her; the sheer thought makes him shudder so he just holds her little body closer and presses a dozen kisses to the top of her head. The scars on his chest scream in pain but he cannot bring himself to care.

He can feel her tiny arms try to wrap around him as she says, “I missed you,” and he swears it’s the sweetest thing he’s ever heard.

But before he can respond, she’s pushing away from him and replacing that wide grin with an angry frown.

“Oh, what now?”

“You didn’ come yesterday,” she says, in what he knows is her best attempt at a scolding manner.

When Davos clears his throat, Jon realizes he’d completely forgotten there were two others with him and Aryanna in the room.

With a nod, the old knight silent exits the room, signalling for Edd to follow, so father and daughter may speak alone.

“Why didn’ you?” she demands again.

In truth, Jon doesn’t know what to say. He would hate lying to her but he can’t just tell her the truth either. He settles on the most ambiguous answer he can come up with. “I’m sorry, love, I was… hurt.”

“Hurt?”

He nods.

“What happened?”

“I was just hurt, okay?”

“Why?”

“Aryanna….”

“Yes?”

She’s at the age where children as question about anything and everything. He remembers in well from Rickon, Bran, and, her namesake, Arya.

He sighs. “Well, I’m here now, alright? And I’m not going anywhere.”

She doesn’t relent, but he can see her glare softening slowly. “Can I make it better?”

“I’m afraid you can’t, love,” he says, brushing her hair back. It’s a good sign that she lets him, or she would have swatted his hand away. She truly is just as feisty as her mother had been.

As Jon continues to sift through her downy curls, she leans her head against his shoulders and wraps her arms around his neck again.

He can tell she is slowly dozing off when her hold on him begins to go slack and he can feel her breathing calm. So, he gets up and walks to the bed, bones still protesting, and gently lays her down and tucks her into the furs.

Jon lies down beside her, knowing what the dawn will bring, but for now he just focuses on the sound of the air entering and leaving her little lungs and recognizes that his are doing the same because he is _alive_.

~

It takes him aback how different Sansa looks. She's still the feminine beauty with polite manners he had known growing up, but the delicate softness of hers has been sharpened into jagged edges.

Now, as she sits across from him, sputtering and coughing from the strong ale he had warned her about, Jon knows that it's time for him to introduce her niece.

“Um… there is someone you should meet.”

Sansa raises her brows in question.

Instead of droning explanations, he simply tells her to wait a moment and crosses the hall to enter Sam’s old quarters, currently abandoned as he has gone to study at Oldtown.

There, Aryanna is sprawled on the floor in a mess of block toys Sam had managed to find in Mole’s Town for Gilly’s son. There are few children there but the brothel has enough bastards for the old woodworker to make toys from his scraps.

“C’mon, you,” he says, leaning down to muss up her hair before flattening it into something somewhat presentable for Sansa, who will most certainly judge him for his parenting. The Free women wear no gowns or dresses so her clothes are identical to those of any boy her age.

“Where?”

“You’re meeting Aunt Sansa.”

“Aunt?”

“My sister.”

She squeals in anticipation of meeting new people and toddles ahead, which he allows since they are just next door.

Ever since he was released from his vows, he has housed her in the castle, though she has made a habit of clinging to any of the Free Folk she recognizes and following them back to the camp to play with her friends there.

He pushes the door open slowly, feeling stupid for the nervous hesitation. Still, Aryanna bursts through without waiting for him.

Jon sees Sansa’s eyes widen immediately and hears a gasp as Aryanna comes closer to the bench at which she is seated.

“Jon,” she whispers.

“I’m Aryanna.” The loud and proud voice cuts through the tension and Jon fights a grin.

Her pronunciation is off, like any child’s, but Sansa seems to understand her name all the same because her eyes go to him and he thinks he sees her smile. Kneeling to lift her, Sansa pulls the child into her lap and says, “I’m your Aunt Sansa.”

There is a certain awe and wonder in her expression as she looks from his daughters hair and eyes and freckles and smile, and he knows all too well how that feels.

“Kissed by fire,” the small voice suddenly speaks up, causing Jon’s stomach to drop.

“What?” Sansa asks.

“Your hair. Papa said my mother’s was too.”

~

Jon isn’t in the mood for a child’s endless chatter when he returns to his private chambers from his extensive argument with Sansa.

She wants to lead a fight against the Boltons, slaughter the fickle lords who took their home, and take back Winterfell. He understands that his naive, fanciful little sister is not who she once was, but she still does not know the price victory comes with, if they are victorious after all.

Still, despite his exhaustion from fighting and leading and politicking, he finds it his duty to help her for what she said moments before he walked away.

“ _If we don’t take back the North, we’ll never be safe -- not me, not you, not Aryanna, and not Arya, Bran, or Rickon if they are even alive. I want you to help me but I’ll do it myself if I have to.”_

Jon had known there was no way he could stay here long, after what happened, though his expectation had been to simply go south to somewhere quiet, get warm, live out his days in peace, and raise his daughter. It is too good to be possible in a world as torn as this, but any amount of tranquility would do him great good.

As he closes the door and shucks his cloak off, Aryanna continues her story, though he can only make out certain words here and there, like “Wun Wun,” and “bear,” and “turnip,” so he knows it’s nonsensical anyway.

“It’s late, go to sleep, now,” he says gruffly.

She was already dressed for bed, now in a little night gown as opposed to the baggy cotton clothes she used to sport. Sansa has begun to take up sewing again, her first project being clothes she deems fit for his daughter.

Aryanna begins mimicking him with an exaggerated, mocking voice but is immediately silenced with one look from him. He has to lift her up onto the bed, where she hastily slips under the furs.

She has been sleeping in his chambers a few nights not, because he cannot trust anyone, anymore, especially since the fact that she is his daughter is now blatantly clear.

As he climbs in afterward, he feels like an absolute asshole for taking his frustration out on her. He wants to apologize but she interrupts him.

“Papa’s sad.”

Time and time again, Jon is taken aback by how atune she is to his feelings at such a young age. “He is.”

“Why?” She doesn’t look at him as she asks it, instead she is turned away in her own little form of protest.

“We have to go south, Aryanna.”

“We are south.”

“Not really,” he laughs, reminded that she spends so much time with the Freefolk that she truly believes this to be as south as one can be.

“But Tormund said!”

“Well we’re going more south.”

“Why?”

He sighs. How can he even begin to explain that to a child? He doesn’t even know the rationality of it all himself. So, he starts at the very beginning, telling her about Winterfell, _home_ , it’s hot springs, secret passageways, and people. He talks to her about his siblings, his father, even Lady Catelyn, briefly. He remembers the Wolf’s Wood and Wintertown, and reminisces on the adventures he and Robb used to have.

No doubt, she fell asleep a sentence or two in but he doesn’t mind.

~

Aryanna’s third name day is quickly approaching and Jon feels terrible for neglecting her so.

Truly, he doesn’t really have many options. As he, Sansa, and Davos tour the North to garner support and troops to aid in the fight against the Boltons, Jon has no choice but to ensure the old Wildling women with her care, and Tormund with her safety. These are not roads for children and it’s a toss up between whether they will be met with open arms, hostility, or worse as they go from keep to keep.

It is long before they return, though Aryanna doesn’t complain, which makes him sadder because it causes him to realize she is growing up too fast. Davos scoffs and laughs because she is _three_ and he already feels this way.

Name day celebrations are not common among the Free Folk so she is positively surprised when her beloved Onion Knight brings her a whittled wolf and Aunt Sansa helps her into a brand new dress, a plain one she found at the tailors but hand-stitched intricate embroidery onto. Her father has no special presents but she is just as happy because he is finally _there_ and so he gives her his undivided attention until, alas, the battle comes around.

For this, Jon is not willing to take any chances. He sends Aryanna and her caretakers, accompanied by a number of soldiers pledged to House Stark, down to Torrhen’s Square. He also has Ser Davos join them, though he protested little, knowing it is for the safety of the child. The Tallharts, a previously great house, are reduced to few surviving members after having to deal with the Lannisters and Boltons, but they managed to reclaim the castle and continue to pledge their loyalty to the Starks.

Aryanna, however, was the real issue. Jon has assumed she handled the last separation well, but apparently not because then she kicked and screamed and refused to leave his side, bawling until her poor voice grew hoarse.

Still, he did not relent. He would have her tucked away far from Ramsey Bolton’s crude grin if the battle ran its course and ended against his favor.

Hours before they are to meet the Bolton army on the field, Jon goes to Melisandre and begs her, on his knees with his hands clasped before him, to please bring him back if he is to fall in battle, for his child’s sake.

~

“King in the North,” a hundred voices say.

It echoes around the stone walls and makes the ground under his feet rumble.

“King in the North.”

The last time Jon was in the Great Hall with an audience of this number and nobility, he was stowed away in the back with the commoners and smallfolk. A bastard was not worthy to sit at the high table.

The irony is insurmountable.

As the camaraderie ends and hall slowly empties, leaving only him, Ser Davos, and Aryanna, seated beside Sansa.

She can barely see over the table but he refuses to hide her away like some stain to his honor. Besides, she has become increasingly clingy after her return, not wanting to be away from her beloved Papa for more than a few moments, despite not even speaking with him in the beginning.

Now, the eerie silence rings through the hall until she, in her little high-pitched voice, yells, “The King in the Norf!”

The three of them laugh and it feels so damn _good_. It's the first time Jon actually likes the title.

“It's ‘ _North_ ,’ silly.”

She's wearing in another dress, fashioned in the true Northern style. Even her hair, done by Sansa, looks how the girls used to fashion it when they were younger, two little braids on the top of her head with the rest flowing out in all of its curly wildness.

“King in the _Norf_ ,” she says again.

It's Davos, who chimes in this time. “Well, works for us, eh?”

He means to show her the joys of Winterfell, see her kid around like he and his siblings used to, but it feels like their ghosts still wander the halls.

~

 _Queen Daenerys Targaryen, First of Her Name, invites you to Dragonstone. My queen commands the combined forces of Dorne and the Reach, an Ironborn fleet, legions of Unsullied, a Dothraki horde and three dragons. The Seven Kingdoms will bleed as long as Cersei sits on the Iron Throne. Join us. Together we can end her tyranny. I appeal to you, one bastard to another -- for all dwarves are bastards in their fathers’ eyes._ _  
_ _Tyrion Lannister  Hand of the Queen_

Jon reads is again, though he practically has it memorized by now.

The decision is made, however unpopular it is with Sansa and the lords of the North.

Still, no matter the great degree to which they dislike their king leaving for Dragonstone, he knows someone who will dislike it more.

The object of his concern runs into the room with a loud giggle, Ghost at her feet.

_Gods, how will I tell her?_

The last year of her life has been so chaotic -- hells, _all_ of it has been -- far more than should be for someone so young and innocent. In between his being Lord Commander and King in the North, Jon’s daughter has suffered some of the consequences as well, barely getting to see her father most days as he's buried in work, and spending weeks away from him because of something she doesn't understand.

This, however, is more than the matter of a couple weeks.

He was reading the damned letter again to try to make sense of the ambiguity of the invite. What will he encounter when he reaches the shores of Dragonstone and steps before Daenerys Targaryen? Open conversation and a queen eager to form alliances or a tyrant who will burn him alive with the three bloody _dragons_ she has she for his refusing to give up the North?

In the solar, there's an armchair situated by the hearth where Aryanna usually sits as he broods over maps and letters.

Today, he walks over to it first and signals for her to climb up. She sits sideways over his legs, her booted feet dangling off to the side of his thigh.

“There's something I have to tell you,” he says gently, wanting to make the blow as soft as possible.

She remains silent and looks to him with wide, curious eyes. He smooths down her hair, though it is somewhat pulled back with two strands from the front.

“I have to go away for a while, Aryanna.”

“Where are we going?”

“ _I_ have to go meet a Queen,” he says simply, emphasizing on the singular ‘I’.

“We’re meeting this Queen?” Her whole face perks up. She doesn't quite know how to read yet but Davos reads to get as often as he can, so she's completely enthralled with the stories of the Targaryen queens of old.

He sighs. “You can't come, Aryanna.”

“Yes I can.”

“No, you can't. It's too dangerous for you.”

“But I have to.”

“You don't, you'll be fine here with Aunt Sansa and Ghost and all your friends.” He tries to pick up an excitatory tone but it does little to shake the sadness from her eyes or stop the wobbling of her lower lip.

“Papa, I’ll be good! No fighting, I'll be nice and have good lady manners and--”

“Hey, shhh, no none of that,” he soothes, as fat tears have begun rolling down her cheeks.

“Don't go,” her helpless little voice says, interrupted by hitches in her breath from crying.

“I'm sorry, love.” He gently rubs a hand up and down her back to sooth her. She lays her head against his shoulder and wraps her arms against his neck to hold on tight.

“You're not.” This time, the pleading, begging tone is tinted with anger.

“I _am_ , Aryanna. I wouldn't go if I didn't have to.”

“But why?”

“She has dragons.” And dragonglass, though he doesn't feel like explaining it to her.

“ _Dragons_?”

“Yes, and we need them.”

“Why?”

“Because….” How does he explain that the stories she's heard of ice monsters have truth to them without frightening the poor girl?

She doesn't wait for an answer. “She really has dragons?”

He has to chuckle. “Yes, three of them we’re told.”

“Like Vinesya?” Her crying hasn't stopped but she is getting distracted, which he interprets as a good sign.

“Yes, like Vi _sen_ ya,” he corrects. “Who told you about her?”

“Maester Wolkan. Is he coming with us?”

 _Us._ And it's back to square one. “You can't come, Aryanna. It's not safe.”

“You said you will always protect me.”

_Gods, what have I gotten myself into?_

Jon knows he can't lie to her and just leave in the night when she's asleep and has no idea. It took days for Aryanna to speak with him again for sending her off before the battle for Winterfell; she will never forgive him for disappearing for… who knows how long. Even at the tender age of three and a half, Aryanna can hold a mean grudge.

He also worries about her treatment while he is away. No one dares say anything to the King’s daughter while he is there, but what will she have to hear when he is hundreds of leagues away?

Of course, Sansa loves her to the ends of the world but he already hears whispers of “bastard” and “Wildling” from the prissy lords who believe everything calls for their commentary.

The Free Folk do not follow the traditional laws of marriage. A lover is a lover and child is a child so the concept of bastardry doesn't quite exist. Nevertheless, she is a bastard by all Westerosi standards as long as her name is Snow.

Still, Dragonstone is even less safe. Who is to say the Mad King’s daughter won't imprison them on sight? He finds that hard to believe, because he trusts Tyrion enough to know he would not support anyone so cruel, and, afterall, she does need allies.

“Please, Father.”

 _Father_. Aryanna has never called him that before, it was always _Papa_ , but _oh_ , how it tugs at his heart.

It's a lost fight at this point.

“Alright.”

She picks her head off his shoulder and the streaks of drying tears on her reddened cheeks make all remaining resistance disappear.

“Truly?” she squeals, smiling so wide that all her baby teeth show.

“Yes,” he confirms with a slight smile of his own. Taking on a serious tone again, he adds, “but you have to listen to me, alright? Promise me no running off or fighting or breaking the rules.”

She nods furiously and promises before throwing her arms around him once again.

He hugs her back and kisses the top of her head.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”


	2. dany i.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is unbetaed but i'm looking for someone to beta the next chapter so holler if you're interested!!  
> you can find me on tumblr at reddoorandlemontree. :)

Dragonstone was built to intimidate. Even from a distance, it looked cold, menacing, untouchable. The only decorum in the place came in the form of dragon motifs displayed throughout the fortress. The old Valyrian stonemasons that had built the castle held pride in Valyria’s dragons but even then, it was more of a display of power than anything else. There is an ever-present chill to the place, not at all what Daenerys expected when dreaming of her far-off birthplace on a pretty island in the south.

Perhaps that is why it feels nothing like home.

It saddens Dany greatly that _home_ , what she has yearned for since the moment she and Viserys fled Braavos, is finally reality yet it disappoints.

In light of her marriage to Khal Drogo, she had hoped the Dothraki khalasar would become her home but it never truly did. They are her people now and yet she is still too different, too much of an outsider, to sustain their ways forever.

Even as she conquered it, she knew that Meereen was little else than a temporary endeavor. Her reason had been the slaves, hundreds of thousands of lives oppressed under shackles and chains, but she knew she would continue this quest for _home_ the moment the city was stable. The children flocked her with cries of _mhysa,_ and the city’s Essosi ways allowed for freedoms found in few other places but, once again, she was too foreign for their culture.

Now, the one single place in the world besides Valyria itself where she is truly not a foreigner, Dany feels out-of-place once again.

 _The Red Keep,_ she likes to think, _the Red Keep is where I belong. It is where I am needed._

And it is true. The country continues to suffer under the tyrannical, totalitarian ways of Cersei Lannister.  
In discussing it with Tyrion, she had wondered exactly what Cersei’s true motives are, for the long-term, that is. Claim the throne and rule but for _whom_? She surely does not do it for the people, who continue to starve and perish. There is no family to protect, with her children dead, her father killed, and her only siblings either sworn to vows that forbid loyalties otherwise or serving as Hand to another queen.

Dany’s train of thought is interrupted by a knock on the door of the council room.

Brought back to reality, she turns to find Jahallo, one of the Dothraki men that had volunteered to stand guard at the top of the steps leading up to the keep.

“Khaleesi, the western men have arrived,” he informs in his native tongue.

The Northmen, he means, though Dany supposes everyone from Westeros is considered western by Essosi standards.

She nods her thanks and follows him out the council room to the throne room just beyond the door, taking long strides up to the throne. Even if she willed it, she would not be able to ignore the thrill of power that rushes through her upon seating herself on the throne, all jagged edges of iridescent stone masterfully carved a millennium ago.

She makes sure to lift her chin high and correct her posture so to exude every bit of queenliness she can. Her council never equivocates in relaying what the Westerosi lords think of her; she knows their prejudices and expectations and intends to counter every single one of them.

This _Jon Snow_ is a peculiar case. She learned of him when a priestess of the Red temple, of all people, presented herself at Dragonstone in the midst of a storm. _I believe you have a role to play, as does another… Jon Snow._  Still, Daenerys had lost faith in blood magic and prophecies long ago, with promises of _The Stallion Who Mounts the World_.

This baseborn-man-turned-Commander-of-the-Night’s-Watch-turned-King-in-the-North had allowed the Wildlings south of the Wall and united them in an army to fight the enemy. As of now, she does not know whether that enemy is Cersei Lannister or herself.

Just then, the grand doors of the throne room open to allow Missandei, Qhono, and Tyrion, and she knows the others must be just outside.

Taking in a deep breath, she prepares herself to face this “ _King”,_ but his arrival is impeded by serious whispers from the corridor that echo into the throne room. There is a hint of sternness, then a sign.

At last, two figures step foot into the throne room -- no, _three._

Dany hadn’t noticed at first but as they come closer, she sees a third, smaller body with the other two. _A child_ , her brain finally catches up, _not more than three or four years in age._  It’s so unexpected that the cold facade cracks for just a moment but she reassembles it just as quickly.

Missandei starts reeling off the list of titles, each like an earned bell to her braid that she carries with pride, but she barely hears them.

The child, a precious little girl clad in boys’ clothing, is looking up at her with such curiosity and innocence, Daenerys finds it hard to look away, though not before she allows herself a smile. When she finally does shift her gaze, she sees the man the girl holds such a strong resemblance to. Instead of the round, soft features of a child, his are angled and sharp, dark eyes bearing into her atop her throne. She recognizes confidence in his posture, protectiveness in the way his hand holds the girl’s shoulder, and something akin to awe that flashes in his eyes for just a moment.

As the echo of Missandei’s voice reciting the last of her titles fades, this so-called King in the North turns back to whom she presumes is his advisor, somewhat sheepishly. At the prompting look, the older man simply says, “This is Jon Snow.”

It sounds comically pathetic. Still, she is aware that there is more to this man than that -- he had, after all, managed to unite thousands of Wildlings and, if her knowledge on Westeros is sufficient, that is nearly as impossible as bringing together hundreds of khalasars beyond Vaes Dothrak’s borders.

“He’s King in the North,” the man adds, grey eyebrows furrowed.

Still _King_ in the North? Before she can comment on it, a small voice cuts across the stirring tension.

“And _I’m_ Aryanna,” the girl says, touching a hand to her heart for emphasis.

Oh, how Dany wants to laugh. All she can allow is a smile, though. If a throne as grand as this is meant to intimidate, she must not let any weakness interfere.

Lord Snow purses his lips but the little tot still beams and stands tall.

“Thank you for traveling so far, my _lords..._  and lady Aryanna,” she adds with a grin. “I hope the seas weren’t too rough.”

“The winds were kind,” Lord Snow responds in a deep gruff. The only person she knows with an accent similar to his is Jorah, but his had seemed to wear off after decades in Essos. Jon Snow’s is stronger, and, dare she say, perhaps even comely.

His advisor interjects. “Apologies, I have a Fleabottom accent, I know.” _Ah, so he is from Fleabottom. What is a man from Fleabottom doing with a Northerner?_ “But Jon Snow is _King_ in the North, he’s not a lord.”

Upon Tyrion introducing him as Ser Davos Seaworth, Daenerys says, “Forgive me, Ser Davos. I never did receive a proper education but I could have sworn I read that the last King in the North was Torrhen Stark, who bent the knee to my ancestor, Aegon Targaryen and swore fealty toward House Targaryen _in perpetuity_.” She knows she is correct, but she asks, “Or do I have my facts wrong?” just so her words leave their desired sting.

The pair look uneasy now, shifting from foot to foot.

“So I assume, my lord, you are here to bend the knee.”

He pauses and looks to the floor; even before he says it, she can tell he is a stubborn man. “I am not.”

Nevertheless, she is taken aback by the simplicity of his outright defiance. “Oh. Well, that is unfortunate. You have traveled all this way to break faith with House Targaryen?”

“Break faith?” he quotes her and it’s the first streak of temper she has gotten out of him, though it is still a quiet simmer. She sees it in the line between his eyebrows, the tension in his demeanor, but his voice never departs from its previous calm as he says, “Your father burnt my grandfather alive, he burnt my uncle alive. He would have burned the seven kingdoms--”

“My father was an evil man. On behalf of House Targaryen, I ask for your forgiveness for the crimes he committed against your family.” And she did, she really did mean it. But still, it feels like she’s going in circles, the same prejudices coming up again and again.

So, when she says, “I ask you not to judge a daughter for the sins of her father,” Daenerys glances to the little girl at his side. She is completely lost on the conflict before her, instead starring in awe at the tall structures of the throne room. He _must_ understand.

She offers to name him Warden of the North, yet he refuses.

“Then why are you here?” Daenerys demands. If he never planned to make alliances, a simple letter would have sufficed.

“Because I need your help, and you need mine.”

It is very hard not to scoff at that moment. “Did you see the Dothraki, all of whom have sworn to fight for me? And did you see the three dragons flying overhead?”

At the mention of dragons, she doesn’t miss the way the girl’s eyes light up with excitement, and Dany’s stomach sinks for a brief moment. She remembers too the well the old shepherd who had laid the bundle of the tiny bones at her feet in Meereen, when Drogon had reduced a poor girl to a pile of charred remains. She blinks away the image.

It’s a quick, snappy exchange of words from then.

“They’re hard to miss.”

“But still, I need your help…?”

“Not to defeat Cersei. You could storm King's Landing tomorrow and the city would fall but you haven’t stormed King’s Landing. Why not? The only reason I can see is you don’t want to kill thousands of innocent people. It’s the fastest way to win the war but you won’t do it… which means, at the very least, you’re better than Cersei.”

 _Better than Cersei_ \-- is that meant to be a _compliment_? “That doesn’t explain why I need your help, my _lord_.”

At first, she thinks Lord Snow is at a loss for words because he doesn’t answer her question where he’d been so quick before, but then he looks to his daughter, who is now watching the exchange with interest. _Ah._ Whatever matter this is, it is not one children as young as her need to hear.

Daenerys sighs, already infuriated by this man who has traveled all this way just to deny her in person and tell her that _she_ , with her invincible dragons and armies, needs _him_.

She has been underestimated and looked down upon by men all her life, but something about this Jon Snow tells her that he is no arrogant, headstrong lord.

With one last look into his eyes, dark and pleading yet poised, she simply nods. Her voice remains just as cold but, for the formality’s sake, she says, “You must forgive my manners. You’re all tired after your long journey. We’ll have baths drawn for you and supper sent to your rooms. We shall meet once you have rested, my lords.”

She repeats the instructions in Dothraki so one of her _kos_ can pass them along to the castle’s servants, faltering when Aryanna looks back and waves goodbye before following her father to their quarters.

~

Dany has her own supper quietly in her solar where everything looks old and unused. Upon first arriving and seeing the grand chambers, she had wondered if that was the very bed where she had entered the world, where Rhaella Targaryen had bled out and took her last breath. She tries not to think about it much, but the thoughts are quite impossible to ignore.

To avoid spies and the like, they had dismissed all the previous servants that resided at Dragonstone with bountiful coin that would last them for years to come, so it is a young Dothraki girl by the name of Ashinni that comes to clean away the table once she is finished.

“Send for Varys on your way to the kitchens, please,” she informs in their shared language, but the girl looks at her dumbfounded until she explains, “The Spider. Bald, sort of… round?”

As she exits with a chuckle and a nod, her Lord Hand enters, wearing a small frown.

“Your Grace,” he says.

She prefers to skip the formalities. “You said you liked this man.”

“I did-- I _do_.”

“So far, he has refused to call me Queen and told me _I_ need _him_.”

Tyrion just scratches at his beard awkwardly before reaching for the flagon of wine and pouring himself a cup.

“And his daughter,” she finally says. “You didn’t tell me he was married. Which house are the Starks tied to now?”

“I don’t believe he is… married, that is.”

“So the girl....”

“For her to have been born within wedlock, he would’ve had to marry some years ago but up until last year, Jon Snow was Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. His bastard, I suspect.”

Peculiar, that he is raising the girl, then. She would assume that the man leading thousands of Wildlings and Northmen would leave the upbringing of his bastard daughter to her mother, whoever she is.

Another knock sounds at the door and the Spider enters, his robes dragging behind upon her bidding him entrance.

“Your Grace,” he bows, joining them at the table.

“What do you know about Jon Snow, Lord Varys?”

The spymaster frowns, contemplating. “I have informed you of all that I know of him, Your Grace.”

“Did your little birds miss the girl crawling at him heel for the past three or four years?” Tyrion quirks an eyebrow.

Varys sighs, addressing her Hand, “I heard whispers of a daughter but I was reluctant to believe Jon Snow had broken his vows to father a child. You know of his reputation, my lord. Ned Stark would have been proud of his bastard. He seemed to exceed his kin when it comes to honor.”

“If he is so honorable, what of his vows to the Night’s Watch? I do not know much about the order but is it not for life?” Daenerys questions. She tries to remember all she knows about it, which is admittedly very little but Jorah would sometimes speak of his father, who served as Lord Commander, and her books on Westerosi history had a chapter or two about the Wall.

“There are rumors, Your Grace,” he says, with an air of dismissal.

“And they are only that,” Tyrion adds, “fanciful rumors with little substance.”

Hands clasped before her, Dany nods. “Well, I want to hear the tale from him. Lord Snow and Ser Davos will join us tomorrow, see to it that they are informed. Perhaps he will explain to me why I am oh so _desperately_ in need of his help.”

~

The sun is hot and searing, a welcome wash of warmth. Dany briefly wonders why it feels so long since it last kissed her skin.

The landscape before her is familiar and deceptively beautiful. A sea of grass for miles in every direction, the winds making it ripple so similar to water that she swears she hears the crashing of real waves too.

A shadow blocks the sun for a moment, followed by a roar. _Rhaegal_. She’s not sure how she can distinguish their cries but it is undoubtedly Rhaegal that flies overhead.

“Papa!”

From a tent she had not noticed before, a running toddler emerges, straight, dark hair brushing his shoulders. His eyes shine hazel in the sun.

“Rhaego.” The name slips from her lips easily though her mind is blank.

“Papa!” He says again, followed by a shriek of joy as he takes the biggest steps his little legs will allow.

It’s odd because she knows the Dothraki word for father is _ave_.

The rumble of Rhaegal’s roar sounds again, emitting an excited shout from her son. _Her son. Her Rhaego_. His features are so like his father except his skin is paler, like hers.

“Papa, look! Did you see it?” He looks up at Rhaegal’s swooping shadow in the sky.

He must mean Drogo so where is he? She turns around, looking for the man her baby boy calls out for.

Suddenly, she feels ice cold hands grab her bare shoulders, hands she knows, hands with rough calluses from his arakh and long fingers that used to bruise her skin each night. They slam her forward and she tries to drink in the sight of her son, her beautiful boy laughing and pointing to the sky, before the world turns dark and the hands push her down onto the bed -- Was there always a bed there? -- and press a pillow to her face. Is this his revenge? Suffocating her in the same way she had ended his final misery?

Dany feels herself scream, feels her throat protest, but the sound is muffled by the pillow. Her skin is no longer bathed in sunlight, but is cold, sweaty. And the sound of the distant ocean seems much closer, the crashing waves overpowering the wind whistling through the tall grass.

Except Rhaego’s voice doesn’t go.

“Look at it fly!”

Drogo’s cold hands. The pillow. Air. She needs air. She had felt as if her arms were paralyzed to her side but she finds them gaining strength now and pushes herself away from the bed, away from the pillows. Her hands are not met with Drogo’s hard body, but with the soft linen of her sheets.

Her breaths come in short gasps as she turns over onto her back, head spinning and a sheen of sweat coating her skin. Her body is weakened, shaking like a hurt animal, so for now she focuses on breathing, simply breathing, and keeping her eyes open to stare at the ceiling of her bedchamber out of fear that the dream will return if she shuts them.

When the shaking dissipates, she pushes herself up and shoves off the blankets, the bedding, the pillows, everything. Her face feels hot in her palms as she brings her knees up and allows the nightmare to slowly disintegrate from her memory.

“Did you see, Papa?”

Her head snaps up, eyes wide at the sound. No, Dany had not imagined it. Her jumbled mind finally catches up to her senses and she heads towards the window where the voice seems to be coming from. Her legs feel as if they might collapse under her weight with each step on the cold stone.

Several feet below, on the ramparts along the castle’s perimeter, are two figures: Lord Snow, clad in a fur cloak billowing in the wind, and Aryanna perched upon his shoulders, pointing at up at the sky, bright with a full moon and a smattering of stars.

Dany’s eyes follow the girl’s finger to where Rhaegal flies overhead, doing loops and dives to emit giggles from the girl.

She finally hears Jon Snow’s voice, saying, “Aye, I know. You said you’d sleep once you’ve seen the dragons and now you’ve seen the dragons, so may we go inside, love?”

“Just a bit more!”

Dany can’t seem to shake Rhaego’s image from before her eyes as she hears little Aryanna plead with her father. Each breath she takes seems to feel heavier, her heart being crushed under the weight of them.

She doesn’t wait to hear more, instead turns on her heel and exits the bedchamber. Thankfully, there are no windows in the solar so she collapses onto the settee by the fireplace, now just holding glowing, charred, logs.

“It was only a dream,” she whispers to herself, throat feeling hoarse. Still, she wonders… Was that a glimpse into the nightlands the Dothraki believe in? Is Drogo awaiting, now with hatred instead of love? Is that how their son would have looked now? Or was it something more?

As the fiery veins rippling through the logs slow fade to black, Daenerys falls back asleep, waking up every few minutes before she can begin dreaming again, too afraid of what lies there. This ensues until morning breaks, marked by Missandei entering with their breakfast on a tray.

She stops short upon seeing the queen curled up in the solar, awake but her eyelids heavy with exhaustion. “Is everything alright, Your Grace?” she asks, setting the tray down and rushing to her side.

Dany has to think for a moment to remember what brought her there. “Only a bad dream, Missandei, nothing to worry about.”

Ever the absolute angel, Missandei pushes back the council meeting till noon, allowing several hours for Dany to finally rest.

“Sleep, Your Grace. Let me see to the rest.”

So she lies in her bed, watching her friend sit at the desk and sort through letters Dany was supposed to see to, and finally allows her eyes to close in a peaceful rest until the sun is higher in the sky and her duties beg her attention.

~

 _Wight walkers. The Night King. An army of walking dead men. Some lifeless creatures made of ice._ Repeating his words in her head, they still sound as tall a tale as they did when he first voiced them.

“Grumpkins and snarks,” her Hand mutters.

It must be an old joke between the two because the King in the North’s scowl fades momentarily but one look at everyone else has him squaring his shoulders in defense again.

“I know it’s hard to believe,” he says, his accent so very prominent as he grows more frustrated. “But you have to trust me.”

He looks up at her then and Dany hates that she has to look away, hates how captivatingly grey his eyes are now that she’s close enough to see their color. They are framed by a smattering of scars she hadn’t noticed in their first meeting either, telling her that he is a man honed by battles and duels.

Sighing, she shifts her gaze to the jagged line of the Wall running across the top of the map. “You are asking me to toss aside this war, favor your story over the needs of my allies and my people, and take my dragons and my armies north instead. To fight dead men.” She punctuates the steel in her tone with raised eyebrows as if to say _Really?_.

“The needs of your allies and your people? Is that how you’re justifying your conquest for the iron throne, Your Grace?”

Every person in the room sucks in a breath at his words, each syllable laced with vexation.

She almost thinks she misheard him, for the mere _audacity_! Her dragons answer in her place, three thunderous roars booming through the room, causing the little wolves and lions on the painted table to tremble.

Still, his stare boring into hers does not waver; she would have been impressed if every fiber in her wasn’t alight with rage. To come to _her_ keep, _beg_ for help, and then _dare_ \--

Ser Davos cuts across, frantic. “Apologies, Yer Grace. His Grace only meant that--that this is greater than the iron throne, than all the seven kingdoms. I’m no use in battle so I do not know these creatures myself, no, but I know the King, Yer Grace. And I know that he is an honest man.

“He made allies of the Free Folk and the Northmen, he was elected Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch, he was named King in the North, not because of his birthright -- he has no birthright, he’s a damn bastard -- but because his people _know_ him, they _chose_ him _._ The enemy you don’t believe in, he fought them for his people, he risked his _life_ for his people, he took a knife in the _heart_ for his people, he gave his own--”

It takes one look from Jon Snow for his advisor to not say anything further. As the older man had spoken of all of his good wills, though, his gaze had dropped, uncomfortable. _He_ is _humble after all_. But what was it that Ser Davos had just said?

“A knife in the heart for his people.” His words leave her lips in a whisper.

“A figure of speech, Your Grace,” Lord Snow tells her, voice softer now. Still, she doesn’t miss the way he visibly tenses, shooting an accusatory glance toward the old knight.

“Let’s suppose you are telling the truth, then, that an army of half-rotten corpses is coming for us all,” she says, stepping to the forefront of the table. Her boots clacking against the stone floor are the only sound in the room as the lord stills in anticipation.

“In the past two years, this _Night King_ has managed to move from here,” Daenerys points to where he had indicated Hardhome earlier, “to here,” and her finger moves merely an inch south.

“In that time, Cersei Lannister has levied religious fanatics to diminish House Tyrell, has killed hundreds of innocents when her schemes backfired, has starved millions of people, has failed to meet their needs, and has even played a hand in allowing the Boltons to take your home.” Her voice stays calm, allowing the words to exude their own power. “I should think, my lord, that Cersei Lannister must be dealt with before we address White Walkers.”

Tyrion chin lifts in admiration and her spirit swells in the way it does whenever she earns his validation and pride. She doesn’t let it show, though, doesn’t let anything break her icy stare down with the King until—

“And by then they’ll have breached the Wall. You’ll be ruling over a graveyard if you wait, Your Grace.”

An angered pang resounds from her chest and her feet carry her from the council room faster than her advisors can follow and she’s glad for it.

~

Ser Davos pays her a visit some time later as she expected him to, given what a failure the meeting earlier had been. He silently joins Dany at the ramparts where she had fled to clear her mind, allowing the coming and going of supply ships to mesmerize her as she stared out to sea.

She sighs unintentionally at her moment of respite coming to an end, assuming the king’s advisor would resume their debates once more.

He surprises her, though, by standing beside her silently before reaching into his cloak and withdrawing a wineskin. He holds it up to her, taking a swig when she eyes it suspiciously.

She doesn’t wait for him to offer it again, just takes the wineskin from his hand and tips it up, yearning for it’s velvety smooth— no, the contents are something else, something with a nasty bite to it and a strong aftertaste.

He chuckles beside her when she hands it back, causing his kind eyes to crease at the corners. “It’s good Northern ale, Yer Grace. Surprised ya didn’t cough and sputter at first taste.”

“Hm… few drinks can unnerve me after having tried Essosi spirits and fermented milk.”

He makes a repulsed face and it’s her turn to chuckle.

Dany knows he came here to say something to her, about war or politics or dead ice men, but she opts to steer the conversation in another direction to stave it all off.

“You said earlier you’re no use in battle yet you’re a knight.” It's more of a question than a statement.

Wordlessly, he holds up his right hand— the hand with only a thumb and the beginning knuckles of his other fingers remaining.

“I was a smuggler,” he explains, “I deserved the punishment.”

“A smuggler?”

“Aye. I hated the damn slums, couldn’t stand the people, the food, the _smell_. I grew up fixin’ up ships at the harbor, knew how to work them, how to come and leave without a trace, so I set off sailing at my first chance. Can’t say I’m particularly proud of it but I sailed to all the free cities. I’d dock at night, empty trade ships of foodstuffs, and by the time anyone noticed, I was already at another city.” Contrary to his claim, he does indeed seem quite proud of it.

“In Robert’s Rebellion…” he sighs, blue eyes glancing towards her to gauge her reaction, but she remains stoic. “There was a siege on Storm’s End. Thousands of men starved for days, weeks, and so many died that I couldn’t fuckin’ stand it so I took my ships with all the stolen food and smuggled it into the keep. It kept ‘em alive until the siege was broken and Stannis Baratheon rewarded me for it.”

“He knighted you?”

“Aye, he did. And he cut off my fingers for my crimes but it was a justice long time coming,” he shrugs.

“You played a role in my family’s downfall, then, but it was still a very noble act, Ser Davos. You deserve the title.” The words slip from her lips unchecked yet true, even as she tries to forgive him for serving another usurper.

Ser Davos’s eyes suddenly turn glassy, looking between hers as if to read them, before they shift toward the sea again.

“I grew up in the Free Cities,” she says, barely above a whisper, her mind all the way across the Narrow Sea. “My brother and I lived in Braavos for a time, until Ser Willem passed and we were forced to run, to Norvos and Qohor and Lorath and Tyrosh and Lys and Myr, unable to stay anywhere for long lest Robert’s assassins find us. We ended up in Pentos, in the grandest home I had ever seen, only for our host to convince my brother to sell me off.”

The old knight doesn’t interrupt, doesn’t judge, just allows her to continue. She doesn’t know why she tells him anything at all but there is just _something_ about him, something inherently… fatherly? Though she wouldn’t know what that means either.

“I once wanted to be a sailor too, you know,” she laughs, turning to look at him for the first time since she began her retelling her journey.

He raises his silver-grey eyebrows, surprised. “Is that so?”

Dany smiles and nods, remembering how intrigued she used to be watching the ship crew work the ropes and sails, until the memory of what happened when she said that to Viserys hits her too. _“You are blood of the dragon -- a_ dragon _, not some smelly fish!”_ followed by her cries and pleads as he hurt her for it.

The painful remnants of the memory must have shown on her face because he nudges her elbow with his to bring her back to the present, as few men would do to someone of her status. Once again, she clears her face, masking whatever weakness she had let him see with queenly poise.

“Ya can still learn, Yer Grace -- you’re barely into your twenties, no?”

“Maybe.” The thought is almost humorously sad. “Maybe after the war is over and there is some semblance of peace in the realms… though if what your King was saying is true, we’ll all be dead by then anyway.” She doesn’t know if she means it in jest or not but either way, she might as well broach the topic she’s been dancing around.

“You have your doubts, Yer Grace, and I cannot fault you for them. It sounds bloody ridiculous, I know, but if you would just hear him ou--”

“Lord Snow should have thought about that before he so rudely questioned my motives, then.” She doesn’t mean to sound prideful but why _shouldn’t_ she have pride? She has survived so much, overcome so much, changed the fates of so many for the better so why is it a crime to have dignity and self-worth?

Ser Davos sighs beside her, running his good hand through the silver hairs on his chin, before saying, “If you are a queen then he, too, is a king, Yer Grace. And he knows as little about you as you know about him.”

~

“Go on, speak your mind,” she tells him, taking a sip of her wine, a rich Tyroshi blend that reminded her of summer.

Dany had asked Lord Snow what he thinks he knows about her and if the way he narrowed his eyes until those dark lashes touched his eyelids is any indication, he thinks it’s a trick question.

The look disappears as quickly as it came as he takes a bite of his lamprey pie instead. Finally, he says, “At the Wall, I heard of a great many of your accomplishments. You freed slaves, fought those who threatened their freedom, and refused to leave until order was restored, if I’m correct.”

“The Wall? I didn’t know word of Dragon’s Bay reached so far.”

He shakes his head, taking a sip of his own wine to wash down the pie. She hates how her eyes follow to his throat when it bobs, pale skin so very--

“Aemon Targaryen, your uncle several times great, I believe, served as maester there. He liked to stay informed on you.”

 _Targaryen._  Her breath catches and hope flares up in her until she realizes his use of the past tense _._ Had Dany been alone, she would have cried and cursed whatever damned Gods were laughing down at her for giving her family on the other side of the fucking world only to snatch it away as soon as she finds out. She is not, however, alone so her eyes close for a moment as she pushes him to the back of her mind. Later, she will grieve but for now, she must be strong. _Blood of the dragon._

“That can’t be all,” she croaks, willing her throat to stop closing up with emotion. “With what you accused me of earlier, there must be other rumors about the Dragon Queen trickling across the North.”

Dany hides a smile when he curiously eyes a piece of pineapple, takes a bite, makes a face, and sets it back down.

He meets her eyes before answering, to judge her reaction, she thinks. The candelabra at the center of the table gives him a pleasant glow where his eyes look a shade warmer than the icy grey she had seen before. His voice is unwavering as he says, “They say you killed your own brother and your husband to take the throne for yourself. You burn men alive like your father once did. Your--” he stops himself, instead saying, “And other tales, Your Grace.”

“Tell me, tell me what else.” One would expect her to be angry but she has heard it all before, time after time. She’s more exhausted by it than anything else.

His sharp gaze finally returns back to the dinner before him though he makes no move to eat any of it. “Your beauty….”

 _My_ beauty _?_ She knows she shouldn’t but she takes the chance to torment him. “You think my beauty is just a tale?”

“Wha—  _no_ , that’s not what I--”

“So you’re saying I _am_ as beautiful as rumored to be?”

Even in the orange glow, she can see his pale skin flush pink as he looks to her pointedly, catching onto her game. “I did not mean offense, Your Grace, I….”

 _Not so good with words then._ She lets the poor man off the hook and dives headfirst into his earlier confessions.

“I did kill my brother and my husband, in a way.”

The goblet of wine stops midway to his mouth. He blinks, just once, but makes no other move.

“You have a sister. Tell me, had your home been infiltrated and you and Lady Sansa were forced into exile, with no coin or roof or aid, only each other left, would you sell her as some glorified bed slave to the highest bidder? Her buyers are a people known for rape and brutality but they are certainly capable on a battlefield as well. What would your choice be?”

His fingers turn white and then purple with how firmly he grips the goblet. His full, pouty lips are in a firm line now, jaw flexing as he clenches his teeth in what must be the most anger Dany has seen him show. “Is that what--”

“I was ten-and-six when Viserys bartered me off to Khal Drogo,” she tells him, voice steadier than she had expected it to be. The meal before them is forgotten as she speaks and he listens. “Inevitably I became pregnant and he saw this as a threat. My brother had had bouts of madness for as long as I’d known him and that night, he pressed a sword to my stomach, said he sold me for an army and if he didn’t get what he bargained for, he would cut my son out of my womb and take me back for himself. Do you blame me for not stopping Drogo when he killed him?”

Jon Snow sets the goblet down and leans back in his chair. “I hope he suffered, Your Grace,” he says, threateningly quiet.

She would have cracked a smile if the subject wasn’t so dire. She accepts his understanding with a nod instead.

“As for my husband,” she breathes--

“You don’t need to explain yourself to me. I had no right to presume what I did.” All the ice in his demeanor, his eyes, his voice, had melted away and _Gods_ , does she wish they had met under different circumstances then. She can’t even begin to explore the possibilities if they had.

Again, she nods in gratitude. Her knife cuts into the pie’s crust as she points her fork to his own plate to resume dinner. She is thankful it is just the two of them, no advisors there to over-complicate it all, no Missandei, ever so observant, to throw knowing looks between them.

“Now, do you have anything reasonable to ask of me?” she asks much later. For a while, only the sound of silver against china had filled the air. She had informed the kitchens to make something Westerosi and though she doesn’t have any precedent to know if the dishes are correctly prepared, they must be close enough if his approval is anything to judge by.

As unpredictable as ever, he tells her about _dragon_ _glass_. Volcanic glass apparently defeats these creatures as well and his maester friend had said Dragonstone just so happens to sit on a mountain of the stuff.

“I will allow you to mine the dragon glass and forge weapons from it. Any resources or men you need, I will provide for you,” she ultimately agrees. What is it worth for her anyway? Some ancient rock she had never even known existed?

When Lord Snow thanks her, the unchanging furrow of his brow indicates he is pleased but not as much as he would like to be, so she adds, “You know my reasons in refusing you and I hope you understand them. I cannot give up my hold on the kingdoms, give up plans already set in motion, for the word of someone I barely know.”

“I am a man of my word, Your Grace.”

 _Are you, Jon Snow?_ “Yet you betrayed your word by leaving the Night’s Watch and seeking a crown, thereby breaking your vows.”

His jaw clenches again, raising the cords in his throat. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“I do not claim to know much about the Night’s Watch but as far as I understand, the vows say--”

“I know what the bloody vows say,” he grits out before remembering himself, meeting her glare with tired eyes. “Forgive me, that was….” He shakes his head, looking down, more troubled than he should be for the slip.  
She pushes back from the table, sliding the chair out to stand and he immediately does the same. “No need for apologies, Lord Snow. I bid you a good night.”

It seems that with every step Dany tries to make them move forward, they take two backward, and with each question she tries to answer about Jon Snow, two new ones arise.

~

The library of Dragonstone is grander than any she has ever seen. Bookshelves touching the ceiling extend to each side, long enough that she can’t even see the end. Rickety ladders are propped up here and there to reach the higher shelves which are even more neglected than the rest. The keep has no maester to see to all the books and scrolls so most of them lie under a thick layer of dust.

Dany doesn’t know how in the world she will find a volume to answer her questions but she must try nonetheless.

Grand chandeliers illuminate the library and tall windows to each side cast moonlight and shadows across the floor. She brings a lantern of her own to skim through the countless titles, searching for anything about the Night’s Watch.

All the signs keep telling her that Lord Snow is an honorable, honest man; he has Tyrion’s approval, the Northmen’s support, Ser Davos’s loyalty, and her own admiration, though she would never confess it out loud.

Many would consider his fathering a child, unmarried and shackled by the Watch, a stain to his honor but she can hardly think so. Daenerys has come to know the nature of too many men to think they would, or should, adhere to such strict, outdated oaths. Besides, children are never a slight, born of a broken vow or out of wedlock or not.

It helps that the historical tomes are in their own section so Dany rounds the shelf to make her way there, almost running into a ladder as she does, except--

She nearly drops her lantern when she sees Aryanna, Jon Snow’s little girl, halfway up the ladder. Her maternal instincts kick in to make her heart hammer as she stutters incredulously before finally finding her words. “What are you _doing_?” she asks, worry causing her tone to be harsher than necessary. “You could fall!”

She doesn’t wait for an answer before setting everything down and climbing the first rung to reach up and take the girl into her arms. Her little body squirms as she whines and protests until she is set to the ground and turns around to see her perpetrator.

“You’re the queen!” she gasps, her adorable accent even thicker than that of her father’s.

“I am,” Dany says, crouching down to straighten the girl’s little nightgown. “And you’re Aryanna.”

“I am,” she copies with a wide smile that showcases all her milk teeth, making Dany’s heart swell. In the flickering light of the lantern, she can see that Aryanna’s eyes match the King’s exactly-- most of her features do, actually, except perhaps the nose and the freckles sprinkled across it. Even her hair is her father’s wild mane of sable and it suddenly makes Dany want to rip off that stupid tie holding all of his back.

Before she can question why in the hells she is alone and up at this hour, Aryanna hops closer and leans in. “I saw your dragons,” she whispers, eyes wide as if it’s some marvelous secret. “You’re like Vinesya!”

 _Visenya_ , she means to say, making Dany laugh, _truly_ laugh, as she hugs her close. “You know about Visenya?”

“Oh yes,” she nods enthusiastically, “Maester Wolkan told me _all_ about her. Your hair is pretty, did y’know?”

The sudden change in topic makes Dany chuckle once more. “Your’s is even prettier, sweetling.”

Gentle little fingers trace the intertwining braids pulling the front strands of her hair back.

“Aunt Sansa used to plait it but I don’t let Mina touch mine ‘cause she pulls.” When Aryanna scowls, Dany swears she sees a small Jon Snow before her.

“And where is this Mina?” she remembers, assuming this is her nursemaid.

“Gettin’ me books for bedtime.” Again, she leans in to whisper another secret. “I’m suppose’ to never leave her sight!”

Dany gasps, dramatic enough to make the girl giggle. “Well let’s go find her then!” She gets up, looking around for this failed maid and Aryanna grasps her hand to follow without having to be told to do so. The feel of her tiny hand in Dany’s makes her stomach swoop in unwelcome melancholy. “How old are you, Aryanna?”

She proudly holds up three fingers and then adds a fourth, saying, “Papa say I’ll be four soon!”

 _Four._ Her Rhaego would have been six this year. Perhaps they would have been fast friends had it not been for her mistakes. She dismisses the thought for there’s no point in dwelling what-ifs.

Her mission to learn more about the Night’s Watch, to see if there are any loopholes in their vows, is entirely forgotten as she scans row after row of shelves to find the damned nursemaid. This _Mina_ will certainly hear an earful from her for letting such a small child, who clearly has mischievous inclinations, out of her sight.

~

The next day had been a tiring one and it’s quite late when her advisors leave her solar to retire for the night. The plans for a siege on King’s Landing had been set in motion days ago, with her fleet departing for Sunspear and Casterly Rock, but they have yet to hear back any news. Still, at such a tense point in this war, they have much to discuss, of Cersei, of the kingdoms, of alliances, of inventory, and so on.

It’s a relief when Missandei stays behind, allowing all of Dany’s stress to melt away as she is ushered in front of the vanity. Her friend stands behind her with an ivory comb and a kind smile, gently brushing out the braids and running the comb over her scalp to ease away all tension.

They were speaking of the Lord Snow, how he bristled her so, with Missandei making suggestive faces all the while. She gave her friend a pointed look before allowing the conversation to lull to a peaceful silence only filled by Missandei’s soft humming.

Dany’s eyes study herself in the mirror. With how drained she feels, she expects to see an age-old Queen, worn out by wars that etch tired circles under her eyes, but her reflection is deceptively unmarred. Her gaze shifts up from her own form to Missandei as she rebraids her hair into a single long rope.

 _Is that--?_ A gasp leaves Dany’s parted lips.

Rich brown eyes find her lilac ones in the mirror, questioning.

“Missandei!”

Dany swivels around on the seat to point to the fading reddish purple mark below her jaw.

Missandei’s hands leave her braid to cover the love mark as she skitters across the room, laughing. Dany gives chase, her own laugh sounding foreign to her ears as she grabs Missandei’s hand and leads her to sit on the bed.

“Tell me, tell me everything!”

Her friend looks down at her crossed legs and Dany figures that had her skin had been lighter, a scarlet blush would’ve visibly bloomed across it.

“You and Grey Worm…? Before he left for Casterly Rock?”

Missandei’s lip bite and the playful scrunch of her nose are all the confirmation she needs.

Dany didn’t mean to be judgemental or rude but… _how_?

Her face must have given away her thoughts because her friend purses her lips to hide a smile before saying, “He’s quite talented with his hands.” A pause. “And his mouth.”

Dany’s jaw drops, gaping.

They chatter and giggle halfway into the night like girls and, _oh_ , it’s just so _freeing_ to feel as young as her age again. She basks in the feeling even after Missandei leaves for her own chambers. Perhaps it’s silly to think so but she hasn’t felt this carefree, this _young_ , since her first night with Daario.

 _Daario._ He had charmed his way into her bed but never into her heart no matter how much she willed herself to at least care for him. She hadn’t missed him, not his gilded appeal or his inflated ego, but now….

Now she finds herself craving something, anything, to dispel the cold weight of loneliness that settles in her stomach. She is happy for Missandei and for Grey Worm too, she really, _truly_ is; if anyone in the world deserves the happiness they have together, it is the two of them, after all they have endured. Still, it doesn’t soften the blow Dany feels as the elation wears off.

Her shadowed lover visits her dreams that night.

When she wakes, the feel of his raven curls sifting through her fingers is already fading.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know there's no good excuses for disappearing for almost a year but i'm 18 years old, life has been a fucking rollercoaster for the past year. i lost my grandparents, studied my ass off for a good GPA, took the SATs, applied and got into my dream college, got a job, and volunteered abroad, all while maintaining friendships and relationships. through it all i was never in the right mindset to sit down and write so i felt very guilty and would read and comment on other fics anonymously lol. i'm really sorry to anyone who enjoys my stories but just disappearing. :/  
> as for this chapter, i know dany and jon are still quite distant but you'll see their relationship transform in the next one, which also deviates from season 7 much more. i have an outline down so it shouldn't take too long.  
> comments are very encouraging and make my heart go :D so tell me your thoughts on this chapter please!


	3. dany ii.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> soooo much thanks to @TheScarletGarden (thescarletgarden1990 on tumblr) and @justwanderingneverlost (justwandering-neverlost on tumblr) for all their betaing help and this amazing moodboard! if you haven't checked out their incredible work already, do it now ya fools!

 

 

Dany seeks out her spot on the ramparts again, the same one as always, but finds it occupied. The King in the North stands there, his daughter propped up in his arms as they face the sea. That great cloak of his billows in the wind like his own set of wings.

They seem to be looking out at Rhaegal, flying over the water all by himself, and it tugs at a previous memory of the same scene. Her fierce, terrifying son is reduced to a show falcon as he swoops and dives before them, flying up toward the sky then free-falling before opening his wings to make a loop.

It’s odd, really. Drogon is usually the one to show off while Viserion is the most playful. Rhaegal had been more reserved from the beginning, her quiet child who would sometimes join Viserion but ofttimes preferred to simply nap by the cliffs. He’s unrecognizable now, gliding the tips of his wings across the water’s surface before pulling up into another trick.

Jon Snow says something she can’t quite hear from this distance and apparently, Aryanna doesn’t hear it either, too mesmerized by Rhaegal to respond in any way.

Dany is about to walk away, not wanting to intrude or eavesdrop, but knows it’s too late when that full little head of bouncy black curls turns her way, spots her, and grins.

Her father looks as well, expression carefully controlled.

It would be rude to turn away now and so Dany descends the steps to join them, nodding to Lord Snow and giving Aryanna a kind smile.

The little tot only gives her a moment’s attention before looking toward the sea again.

“His name is Rhaegal. He likes you,” Daenerys says, smile growing wider when Aryanna’s eyes light up.

Out the corner of her eye, she sees Jon Snow’s heavy stare on her — feels it, rather — but his gaze flits away when she tries to meet it.

Before she can dwell on it, Aryanna cups her hands around her mouth and yells, “Come, Rhaegal!”

“He’s not a direwolf like Ghost,” her father explains with a small chuckle, “He won’t just—”

Rhaegal soars closer, his claws making the stone beneath their feet tremble as he clings to the cliffside, his wing spikes curling over the stone barrier. His great head is close enough to pet and hundreds of feet below, his tail dips into the crashing water.

Golden eyes blink at them, pupils dilated from thin slits to round pools of black in excitement and curiosity. Though it may sound like a menacing growl to any stranger, Dany realizes he is _purring_.

So stunned by his behavior, she remains motionless, speechless, as does Lord Snow.

She sees Aryanna extend a chubby hand out to his snout and, had it been anyone else, she would’ve stopped them immediately but for some reason she can’t quite grasp, she knows Rhaegal would never hurt her.

Dany’s connection to Drogon is the strongest but she still feels her other children’s pain, their glee, their fury, their affection.

At that moment, all she feels from Rhaegal is wonder, complete wonder and awe and an odd hint of familiarity, as the girl pats his muzzle like he’s nothing more than a pet pup. She could get lost in the feeling so easily, allow that wonder to sweep her away, until her other sons’ cries in the distance jolt her to reality.

She looks over to see Jon Snow still as much in awe as she had been, though close to tears with parted lips — not an unusual reaction for anyone seeing dragons up close for the first time. They are, after all, magic materialized, fire made flesh.

Eventually, Rhaegal leaves to join his brothers and Lord Snow departs for the castle after a brief, distracted conversation, Aryanna excitedly telling her _Papa_ the story all the way back to the castle as if he hadn’t been there too. Dany stays, still so marveled by the interaction.

It had taken _years_ for Drogon to heed her, so how come Rhaegal so readily listened to the word of a stranger? To a little girl from the North, at that?

~

No matter how much she thinks on it, there are no answers to what Dany had witnessed at the ramparts, forcing her to dismiss it as just part of Rhaegal’s moodiness. The Northern pair aren’t the only ones the dragons have permitted to come close, after all. Rhaegal and Viserion had deemed Tyrion trustworthy enough to let him open their shackles, which, despite being an entirely different situation, is the only explanation she has.

As their stay at Dragonstone is prolonged by the mining work, she begins to see more and more of Jon Snow’s little girl.

Their Northern guests were given rooms in the same wing as the lord’s chambers Daenerys occupies. For two decades, the only residents of Dragonstone had been Stannis Baratheon, his wife and child, and a dozen or two of his men. The keep has hundreds of rooms but, unused and unmaintained as they were, fixing them up to a high lord’s standards would have required more time than what was available before Jon Snow and his party rowed ashore.

Aryanna is quite content there. Although neither of them knows a word of the others’ language, she became fast friends with Rakharo’s youngest son after he came to the keep with his father one day. The nursemaid, Mina, used to take them to the gardens, not wanting to trouble the Queen with the children’s ruckus, but after they managed to escape twice, Dany herself insisted they stay within the castle walls. Even if she did trust the dragons to not mistake them for lunch, they were only three and five, she wouldn’t have them running about by the cliffs or the sea.

Now, the pair can be heard playing up and down the corridor, laughs and screams and arguments in mixed languages echoing off the high stone walls. Sometimes, they try to engage the Unsullied guards into their games, cracking even the most stoic ones to at least smile. Contrary to the nursemaid’s concerns about disruptions, she finds it comforting, and so the doors to her solar stay open while she works.

Aryanna Snow brings warmth to Dragonstone while Jon Snow brings an hour of respite for Daenerys.

Near daily, she and Lord Snow sup together unless he works late in the mines or she has other Westerosi lords to broker alliances with. They speak of everything but this war and its politics and any other topic that is bound to bring up conflict. Instead, she learns of his childhood, his siblings, and the Wall, where he went from arrogant trainee to steward to Lord Commander to, somehow, King in the North. She doesn’t ask how that even happens, not wanting their truce, of sorts, to be compromised. Instead, tells him the better stories of her upbringing in Essos, freeing the slaves of Astapor and Yunkai and Meereen, and uniting the Dothraki under one _Khaleesi_. If he doesn’t believe her, he doesn’t show it.

It was Missandei’s idea to invite the King in the North to dine with her again after their fruitless first attempt. _“Lord Snow does not know you as your people do, Your Grace. He knows little else besides your name and you did not earn our loyalty with your name,”_ she’d pointed out, and Dany had selfishly agreed, both of them lying to themselves by not voicing any ulterior motives. Tyrion had nodded along, though somewhat suspiciously.

Lord Snow will return from the mines in the afternoon, all disheveled and pretty, then wash up, feed his daughter, and put her to bed before joining Dany for their own supper. She doesn’t mind that it is later than she is accustomed to, she doesn’t mind at all.

In fact, she looks forward to it now, as she tries so very hard to not nod off and fall asleep right on the book splayed open on her desk. It’s a mind-numbing tome outlining each Westerosi house significant enough to be mentioned, listing all of their castles and liege lords and sigils and words. _If I am to rule, I need to know who I am ruling over_ is her mantra as she reads and rereads the same passage on House Crane, this time trying to actually retain some of it.

She’s shaken from the painfully small writing when a trembling voice calls to her from the open door.

It’s Mina, alone, looking afright with nervous hands trying to smooth out her dress. “I—I don’t mean to disturb, Your Grace, but—”

“What is it? What happened?” she asks, crossing the solar in a second. It is then that she notices the silence in the corridor. Her heart plummets to the bottom of her stomach.

“I swear they— they were just here, I left for a second to use the privy ‘cause — oh gods, now I’m speakin’ ‘bout the privy to the Queen — but I don’t ever leave them alone too long, I don’t know how they could disappear like that! And oh, the King! What will he—”

Without listening to another word of her rambling, Dany pushes aside, boots clacking loudly on the stone as she finds the nearest guard.

_How in all seven hells did a boy of five and a girl not yet four manage to get lost with guards at each corner?_

All whom she asks are just as clueless as herself so the only option left is to send out search parties all over the island. It’s suffocating to think about the dangers they can get themselves into, one scenario after another running through her mind, the choking fear heightening with each possibility.

Jon Snow will return from the mines soon. Just imagining his reaction has her—

A joyous scream echoes from down the hall, followed by Rakharo’s own thunderous laughter. She’s on her feet in an instant, a deep exhale of relief lifting the millstone from her chest. Her bloodrider appears at the door, dipping low as he enters so the tot riding on his shoulders doesn’t bump her head.

Upon seeing Dany, Aryanna kicks her legs to be lowered then extends her arms out, squealing.

Too heavy to carry for long, she takes Aryanna into her arms and stands her atop the desk so to be at eye-level. “ _Where_ have you been?” she scolds, just gentle enough to not scare her.

Instead of replying, she bites her lip with her little milk teeth then looks to Rakharo, tittering.

“I found the little filly chasing my son through the khalasar tents, Khaleesi, unharmed and so happy,” he answers in Dothraki, smiling wide enough to show all of his teeth, real and gold.

Aryanna doesn’t understand a word of what he says but nods proudly. She stands there with her shoulders back and belly out, shirt and trousers tracked with mud. Her little grin is too endearing for anyone to stay mad for long.

Still, as Dany plucks bits of grass from her tangled mass of curls, she says, “Promise me you will never run off like that again.” Her tone is firm but kind and she stares into those grey eyes identical to _his_. “If you wish to go elsewhere, you will ask your father and take Mina with you, should he permit it.”

“And if I don’t?”

Dany is so taken aback at her quick tongue that all she can do is lean back, eyebrows raised in shock. “Hmm… I suppose you’ll have the dragons to answer to,” she jests.

Aryanna only doubles over in giggles. “I ain’t scared of ‘em!”

“Then perhaps I’ll have my good friend Sigorn pay a visit,” she grins, remembering Jon Snow telling her that a Thenn by the name of Sigorn is the only person that Aryanna has ever been afraid of.

“Nuh ah!" Her face becomes serious, plump lips set in a pout. “You know him?”

“I do,” she says, poking her belly to hear some of that bubbly laughter again.

Ultimately promising, Aryanna stays with her in the lord’s chambers until her _Papa_ returns from the mines.

Jon Snow is an entirely different man with his daughter. The girl bounds into his arms and he kisses her crown, blissfully unaware of her adventures that Dany will make known over supper. He smiles so much more than he ever does with her, she has to remind herself to not stare. When he laughs, a little dimple forms at the top of each cheek and she makes it a personal mission to be the one that puts them there.

As they depart to get Aryanna fed and put to bed, she waves goodbye over her father's shoulder. “Bye, Dany!”

At that, he spins around, amusement tugging at the corners of his lips. “ _Dany?”_

Inexplicably, her stomach _swoops_ at the way the deep burr of his voice wraps around the two syllables. She clears her throat before explaining, “I won’t hear any talk of ‘Your Grace’ from her and she cannot pronounce ‘Daenerys’ so she has taken to calling me ‘Dany’.”

“Dany,” he says, softer this time. She thinks it’s more to himself than to her.

“ _That_ is a privilege reserved only for your daughter, Lord Snow.” Her cheeks grow hot like a silly maiden’s and she desperately hopes he cannot tell. “For now.”

~

The fire from the torch flickers across his face and a similar fire blooms low in her belly.

In the glow, Jon’s eyes shine the color of Valyrian steel and a full moon and grey opals — she’s not sure when exactly she began referring to him as _Jon_ in her thoughts but she likes it. _Jon_.

Even with the bright flame so close to him, his pupils dilate when he looks to her, struck at her words. “ _Isn’t their survival more important than your pride?_ ”

It would be so _easy_ , so blissful, to lean in and taste his lips, to weave her fingers into his hair and clutch him close and yank off his stupid armor, to unburden herself of her own clothes and complications until the only thing between their hearts is flesh and blood and bone.

But her path allows no such liberties. They’d paint her as an evil seductress, a dark sorcerer, a foreign whore, that ensnared the King in the North in her black widow’s web to make him kneel. And if Cersei caught news of anything between them, she would think it a political match. She would not hesitate in destroying the North if she thought their king was siding with the Dragon Queen. His family has already suffered too much from the Lannisters to suffer more because of Dany’s recklessness.

With one last glance to the haunting drawings on the cave wall, she steps from the small area, wanting to put some space between them in hopes that it’ll relieve the suffocating tension in the air.

His hand plants firmly on her lower back to guide her through the jagged-walled, narrow passage. Her heart stutters until Missandei and Ser Davos come into view and his hand retracts, though she can still feel its ghost.

Daenerys is almost glad to see Tyrion and Varys outside the cave, hoping for a distraction from the feelings she should not be feeling, but the looks on their faces are grim enough for acidic apprehension to scorch her insides before they’ve even said a word.

There is no dining with Jon Snow that night. She locks herself away to mourn her allies, her companions, and remembers the Queen of Thorns’ words: _Are you a sheep? No. You’re a dragon. Be a dragon._

~

Jon Snow does it again. Drogon let out a bone-chilling roar, fearsome enough to have any man soiling his breeches and running for cover, yet he stood his ground. An ungloved hand reaches out to his great maw, just as Aryanna’s had to Rhaegal. She’s too confused and awed by it to fear Drogon’s reaction as she should, but pushes the feeling aside as she steps down and off his wing.

“They’re beautiful, aren’t they?”

A smile flickers across his lips as he pulls his glove back on. “Wasn’t the word I was thinking of….”

_Oh?_

“But yes. Gorgeous beasts,” he corrects himself, somewhat sheepishly, at her look.

“They’re not beasts to me,” Dany explains, wanting him to understand even if he may think it makes her a mad woman. “No matter how big they get, no matter how terrifying to everyone else, they’ll always be my children.” _And the only I shall ever have_.

In her peripheral, she sees his gaze settle on her then flit away. It’s practically become a game for them at this point.

Jon asks her of Highgarden, his questions laden with a judgment that she’s not unused to.

She explains her actions but also reminds him, “We both want to help people. We can only do that from a position of strength and sometimes strength is terrible.”

Since their first dinner together, they’ve never spoken about the war, save their conversation in the cave. Otherwise, anything that is bound to make them quarrel is carefully tiptoed around. The unsaid rule had just been broken when they talked of her enemies and his own and power itself. Another one of their “rules” is that any information exchanged over the meal is offered freely, not demanded.

And so, while they are already breaking those rules, she asks him something that’s been gnawing at her for the past three weeks. “When you first came here, Ser Davos said you took a knife in the heart for your people.” The question is unvoiced but present all the same and she doesn’t miss the way it makes him tense.

Before he can give her a proper answer, something besides an obvious lie, her bloodriders appear. She has half a mind to shoo them away until they inform her of a man claiming to be her friend.

 _Jorah the Andal. Ser Jorah Mormont._ It’s all Dany can do to not jump into his arms like a little girl. She still embraces him, feeling him strong and _alive_ against her. Their journey had begun with deception yet he always sought to serve her, always obeying her word. Even now, he only stands before her because he fulfilled her command that he find a cure to his seemingly incurable illness.

They trek toward the castle, the Dothraki leading the way with Jorah behind them and Jon and Daenerys at the rear. She can make out the scaled scars climbing up the back of Jorah’s neck, still red and angry, reminding her to have a healer sent to his chamber seeing as Dragonstone has no maester.

They reach the fork in their path, one corridor taking Dany to her own chambers, and the other leading to where Rakharo said Ser Jorah can be housed. “I believe I have someone I still need to greet,” she says in farewell.

He nods, shooting a wary glance toward Jon beside her, then dips his head in a low bow. “My Queen.”

As they turn, Jon’s scowl, unwavering since Jorah arrived, finally fades, replaced with a knowing grin. “She was down for a nap when I left but she should be up by now.”

And up she is, screaming bloody murder as Mina tries to pull her off the curtains she had climbed up.

“What is the meaning of this?” Jon booms beside her.

Mina lets go immediately, hands behind her back and head bowed. “Your Grace.”

Aryanna takes the opportunity to jump up off the sill and climb further up the curtain to cling to the rod, as easy as a monkey would scale a tree in Norvos, until her father walks over and plucks her off.

“I... I only tried to fix her hair, Your Grace, I was gentle, I swear it—”  
  
“Was not!” Aryanna retorts.  
  
It’s then that Dany notices a comb still stuck in her curls.

“S’alright, Mina, I know how she can be,” Jon says, to which his daughter directs her lethal glare towards him instead. The maid is dismissed and he puts Aryanna down on a chest, riffling through the parchment and toys littered over every surface in search for a tie.

Dany watches from the door as he untangles the comb from her hair and brushes it back in gentle strokes, much gentler than she would ever have imaged for a warrior such as him. She expects to feel like an outsider, for those acrid, dejected feelings to return and yet… they never do.

Aryanna doesn’t even notice she’s there until she asks for “a braid like Dany’s” and Jon sighs, looking to her for help. She laughs at his cluelessness and nudges him aside to stand behind Aryanna. She turns around then, gasping, “You’re back!”

Before she knows it, Dany has a three-year-old clinging to her neck. The force of her lunge would’ve knocked her back if Jon hadn’t been there to steady her with firm hands on each shoulder that linger a moment longer than necessary.

Daenerys ends up staying there for supper. Whilst she was finishing up the plait, a single woven braid out of fear that anything more complex would require pulling at her hair, a serving girl came by to drop off Aryanna’s dinner, a plate of kid-food prepared the way Jon had informed them it was at home. Dany had asked her to bring in her and Jon’s dinner there too, causing Aryanna to clap wildly.

It’s possibly the most fun she’s had in… had _ever_ , perhaps.

Aryanna is learning her letters and proudly recites them for the audience. Half of them are made up or out of order but she and Jon still shower her in praise.

It takes a lot of coaxing for her to eat each bite and Dany finally understands why Jon arrives so late for their own meal. Aryanna gets distracted every two seconds, asking a million questions about the million things that pop into that little head of hers. Just for the slice of mango alone, she asks “What’s this?” “Who makes it?” “Where’s it from?” “Why’s it orange?” “Why?” “Why?” “Why?” It’s precious but Dany enjoys Jon’s exasperation even more.

He has to hand feed her each bite, saying Aryanna is not to be trusted with a fork and knife, until she grows tired of feeling “like a baby”. Dany helps cut up the leg of lamb into manageable pieces, letting her stab at them with her fork happily. They fall into a peaceful lull, one where she wouldn’t have been able to stop smiling even if she wanted to — until Aryanna goes for the soup next. Splashes of creamy chestnut fly everywhere.

Jon curses, Dany gasps, and Aryanna repeats it for the rest of the afternoon. She’d never imagined how absurd it would sound to hear “Fuckin’ hells” in that sweet little voice.

When Aryanna insists on eating her pastry before the main course and has no dessert left for afterwards, Jon tells her she shouldn’t have eaten it first and forbids her from taking any more, knowing all the sugar will make it hard for her to fall asleep. Dany sneaks one onto her plate when he is turned away.

She thinks she falls in love with Jon Snow’s voice that night. Terms of endearment follow almost everything he says to his daughter. _Darling, love, my love._ At one point, Dany asks for him to pass the flagon of wine and he accidentally says, “Yes, my love.” Her hand stills in the air midway to her goblet. He doesn’t realize it until he meets her wide eyes and, almost instantly, his face flushes a hot red. The awkwardness is brushed aside when Aryanna asks why she can’t have some wine too.

The melancholy doesn’t hit until she’s settled in for bed. Alone. No family of her own to love and no possibility of ever having one either.

~

“I thought Arya was dead. I thought Bran was dead.”

Bran, the mischievous little boy who’d follow his big brothers around, the one who loved to pull pranks and climb the walls until he was crippled by a fall; and Arya, the favorite of his siblings though he’d never admit to it out loud, the fierce little wolf with a heart of gold, one of his daughter’s namesakes.

“I’m happy for you,” she tells him earnestly. His family is back home, safe and alive against all odds. So why does he look so upset?

“ _Bran has returned from beyond the Wall. He says he saw the Night King and his army of at least 100,000 marching towards Eastwatch-by-the-Sea. Proof to come._ ” he reads. “If they make it past the Wall—”

Varys interrupts. “The Wall has kept them out for thousands of years. I detest sorcery but it is said that the Wall was built with curses to protect from these… White Walkers.”

“Presumably, there is no one left beyond the Wall that they can harm and the Wall protects everyone else,” Tyrion speaks up next. “But what was that bit about _proof_?”

“I don’t know,” he sighs, tossing the roll of parchment onto the table, “I don’t care. I _need_ to go home.” Inexplicably, his words feel like an icy gale washing over her.

“You said you don't have enough men.”

“We'll fight with the men we have — unless you'll join us.” Even as he says it he must know it’s not a possibility, though she’s come to know him as an honest man, a _good_ man. But still….

“If I could, you know I would do so without hesitation but as soon as I march away, Cersei marches in. I cannot have her ripping apart the kingdoms, they’re suffering far too much as is.” She tries to tell him with her eyes that she believes him, really, _truly_ believes him, but what does that amount to when she cannot act on it? It would be foolish to give up her holds when there is already a 700 foot wall protecting them.

“Perhaps not.”

All heads turn to Tyrion, still deep in thought, the turning gears in his head practically loud enough for all in the room to hear.

“Cersei thinks the Army of the Dead is nothing but a story made up by wetnurses to frighten children. What if we prove her wrong? What if we send men north of the Wall to find one of these dead men? If the truth is presented before her she has to see the urgency of the matter. My sister is many things but she is not stupid… well, not entirely, anyway.”

Daenerys is still trying to understand the plan when Jon speaks up. “It’s possible. The first wight I ever saw was brought into Castle Black.” He pauses, stealing himself almost. “The Free Folk would help us, they know the enemy and I… I know the Free Folk. We could—”

Comprehension hits her suddenly, her lungs constricting for just a moment before she finds her words. Several voices speak up at once, including those of Ser Davos and Jorah, but hers is the loudest. “No.”

While Tyrion looks at her in mingled surprise and disapproval, sensing the underlying reason behind what she’s about to say, Jon stills entirely.

“I haven’t given you permission to leave.” It’s a _shit_ excuse, a flimsy mask for all that she refuses to acknowledge.

“With respect, Your Grace, I don't need your permission. I am a king. And I—”

“It’s too dangerous. You will die, Jon Snow. You have a _daughter_ who depends on you — and I won’t allow… potential allies… to throw themselves into the most deadly place in the world, I won’t.”

“Your Grace, it is the only way to get Cersei to put aside this war to fight creatures she doesn’t even believe in,” Tyrion says at her side, pleading.

Dany hates it, she bloody _hates_ the way he speaks to her like some ill-tempered green girl whose decisions revolve around a boy she fancies.

She only spares him a momentary glance before standing, resting her hands atop the great map and leaning forward on her arms. Her mind whirs with calculations faster than she can keep up. “Ser Davos, how long would it take to sail to Eastwatch?”

“‘Round three weeks if the winds are kind, Yer Grace,” the old sailor frowns.

“Three weeks’ journey. Then say you _do_ manage to capture a wight and survive. It would be another four weeks until we meet with Cersei. Then say she _does_ agree to the truce. Add another five weeks, perhaps more, for the Lannister troops to march north from the Westerlands and the Reach, and Dothraki and Unsullied from Dragonstone, and your men from their own holdfasts in the North.”

“Three moons in total, Your Grace,” says Missandei, ever so quick.

She looks to Jon then, his usually warm, though somewhat moody, eyes now showing only exhaustion.

“The plan would take too long to be effective for an issue as urgent as you claim it is.”

He doesn’t respond, only nods in resignation and shifts his gaze to stare at Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.

Tyrion draws her attention away from the way Jon flexes his hand, an idiosyncrasy of his when he is conflicted as she’s come to notice. “What do you suggest, then, Your Grace?” _There it is again_.

“I don’t know yet. But I do know this _hunt_ will never take place.”

~

It seems that the men of the Night’s Watch had a similar idea.

The following morning, a raven arrives at Dragonstone, carrying a letter sealed with plain black wax.

_Jon Snow. The King in the North._

_Some days ago, one of our brothers died just beyond the castle. He returned with blue eyes replacing his brown ones and we managed to capture him. He is locked away in an old supply crate and being sent to you on a black-sailed ship headed for Dragonstone. The Great War is here. I hope our fallen brother helps convince the Dragon Queen to bring fire to the north._

_Cotter Pyke. Commander of the Eastwatch garrison._

The creature arrives a fortnight later.

Daenerys Stormborn has seen many things in her life. She has seen warlocks and witches and red priestesses and faceless men. Hells, she has birthed dragons from petrified stone and walked through fire unscathed. But she has never seen anything like this.

The stench alone was sickening enough but it had not prepared her for the sight of it. Skin turned black as pitch by rot, fallen off in places to expose the curdled blood and white bone beneath. Lips pulled back over teeth, eye sockets hollow but shining an unnatural blue, lifeless yet living.

Even the Unsullied fear it. They’ve been trained to be fearless, thrust into danger time after time until all human feeling was smothered but never have they trained against something like _this_.

It only takes seconds for it to overwhelm her, her breaths coming in short gasps and coating her lungs with the dead particles. Walking away from it, she imagines an army of them, a mass of twenty— fifty— _a hundred-thousand_ dead men. And suddenly the massive ice wall, the only thing between them, seems a flimsy little split-rail fence.

Perhaps the parley was not an entirely bad idea.

A week goes into setting it up. “ _The only person Cersei listens to is Jaime. And Jaime listens to me,_ ” Tyrion had said, and so her Hand was smuggled into the capital to put the plan in action.

It’s a rather tense affair. Dany knows Cersei Lannister has artillery that can harm her dragons but also knows she’d be a fool to use it — the moment one of them is struck, the other two would burn the keep, the Lannister army, and the Iron fleet into ash.

There are many for whom she can finally put faces to their names. Euron Greyjoy, the vile pirate who robbed her of two crucial alliances, now peering at her greedily with his kohl-darkened eyes. And Cersei Lannister, who tore Jon’s family apart, whose husband tore her own family apart, sitting not twenty feet from her in an armored gown with a crown atop her blonde head. She tries to suppress the way her blood boils seeing them sit there, not suffering a single consequence for their crimes.

Sharp words slice through the thick air in quick, snappy exchanges until the box is kicked open and the creature scrambles out.

Eventually, Cersei secedes. “The Crown accepts your truce. Until the dead are defeated they are the true enemy,” she says. While everyone breathes a sigh of relief, Dany knows that cannot be all and she’s proven right. “In return, the King in the North will extend this truce, he will remain in the North where he belongs, he will not take up arms against the Lannisters, he will _not_ choose sides.”

Jon’s sword hand flexes — his little tell. “As of now, the North remains independent. We do not take sides in southerners’ wars.” There’s a subtle difficulty in the way he bites the words out which leaves her to wonder if it’s the whole truth.

“It's settled, then. My armies will march north to fight alongside yours. And when the Great War is over, perhaps you’ll remember I chose to help.”

Something about her words sends a prickle of trepidation up Dany’s spine that she ignores for now.

~

Perhaps it’s the dress. At her request, Missandei had brought out an older one from Meereen, the comfortable black fabric looping around one shoulder to cross her chest and drape over the other with a silver band at her waist to hold it all together. For one night, she’d wanted to ditch the leggings and corsets and stiff coats and sharp shoulders for something soft. It seems to have softened her guarded heart too.

Or perhaps it’s simply the wine. They’d been sipping at it lazily from the three-seater sofa by the hearth, exchanging soft, distracted words. Their dinner was finished and swept away hours ago but he stayed.

Whatever it is, this unyielding force pulls them toward each other. Half the candles have already burned away into pools of wax sticking to the candelabrums around her solar, leaving them in the hazy glow of the remaining few. She doesn’t even remember getting as close to him as she is now, doesn’t remember who made the move to lessen the distance between them, but now her lips are mere inches away from his while her worries are a million miles away from her.

Dany’s stomach knots in excitement, ready, _so_ ready to feel their softness, the scratch of his beard, and the glide of his tongue against her own.

“Jon.” His name, just his first name, falls from her lips in a whisper.

It’s the first time she has addressed him as such and it seems to make something flare within him. His eyes change — they have a new intensity to them whereas before they were softer, deep with something she refuses to think on for too long. She doesn’t know she’s moving closer still until his lids lower as he looks between them, coming up to meet her halfway.

All at once, her long-forgotten sense returns with a crashing wave, pulling her down into ice-cold water that jolts her hand up to Jon’s chest to stop his advancing.

“Aryanna,” she blurts out, still under the spell of whatever magic that had nearly consumed her.

He had almost looked scared at first, perhaps of rejection or hurt, she’s not sure, but now he’s just confused. Beneath her hand, she feels his heartbeat slow from its frantic pace.

“Her mother. Is she— are you and her still….”

His chest lowers with a short sigh and Dany almost feels foolish for asking the question _now_. In moments like these, she had wondered it too often, though — does he have a lover waiting for him back home? Even if it is not love, can she really bear the guilt of coming between the girl’s family?

He slumps into the cushions, head back against the pillow as his eyes study her. Perhaps it would be wise to take her hand away but then again, how is _any_ of this wise?

“Her name was Ygritte,” Jon finally says.

“Oh.” Between the way he sounds choked up by emotion and his use of the word _was_ , she comes to the conclusion quickly. “I’m sorry,” she breathes, subconsciously moving her thumb in little circles over his heart.

He stops her and takes her hand into both of his, brows furrowed as he thinks over something. Slowly, he tells her. The fierce, red-haired wildling he was supposed to execute but couldn’t bring himself to. She had captured him and led him to the King-Beyond-the-Wall. So desperately she’d wanted to believe he could be free like her but he was too bound by duty to stay forever.

“You did what you had to do to survive,” she assures him, seeing guilt weigh down his entire being.

Jon shakes his head, adamant. “She defended me and I lied to her, again and again, even as I laid with her. What sort of man does that? And when I left the Free Folk after they wanted me to kill an old man to steal his horses, she shot me full of arrows.”

“Aryanna, was she already….” Dany doesn’t want to complete the question, for just imagining it seems uncharacteristic of him.

“No, _gods_ no.” He pauses, eyes focused on their intertwined fingers yet so far away. “Sometime after I returned to Castle Black, the Free Folk attacked the Wall. It was my duty to _shield the realms of men,_ as our vows say, and so I did. At one point, I turned around and there she was, an arrow drawn in her bow, aimed at me. I knew she couldn’t do it just like I couldn’t kill her but before either of us could say a word, my steward shot her through the heart.”

Dany squeezes his hand, heart aching to match his.

“Aryanna….” For the first time since she asked the question, he smiles. “More than a year later, after I’d been elected Lord Commander, one of the Free Folk told me about her. He thought the Watch would hang me for fatherin’ a child with one of them but he figured some protection came with the new position.” He scoffs, and she doesn’t understand why but lets him continue anyway. “It’s not uncommon for their children to grow up parentless but I couldn’t bear stayin’ away, not with….”

“Not with what?”

“I never knew my mother; I still don’t know if she’s alive or dead or if she ever cared. I didn’t want my child to grow up with the same uncertainty. She has me, ‘course, and I tell her that Ygritte loved her too but I don’t even _know_ if she did — I’m sure she had her bow in hand before her babe had even opened her eyes,” he chuckles somewhat ruefully. “And when I was… released from my vows, I wanted to take Aryanna and leave that bloody Wall, go somewhere warm, I don’t know, but Sansa convinced me to help take back Winterfell instead.”

 _Released from my vows_. It would be too much to ask him to explain that now but the curiosity still lingers in her mind. Dany means to offer her condolences instead, assure him of his choices, but before she can speak, alarming knocks sound at the door.

Their bodies spring apart and his hands leave hers for where his sword would be, only to grasp at air.

The door is pushed open to reveal Tyrion and Varys, dressed in their plain bedclothes, wearing expressions of urgency that falter when they see the Queen and Lord Snow strewn across a couch in her dimly-lit solar.

“What? What is it?”

“We just received a raven, Your Grace,” says Varys. “I was unsure of the reliability of Cersei’s promise so I had one of my little birds look into it. Earlier today, he reported back after he heard Cersei tell Ser Jaime that she is pregnant.”

She sucks in a breath. A child. An heir. But if anything, that just reinforces the truth of her word, does it not? What mother wouldn’t join the fight in the North knowing that, without her help, it means almost certain death for everyone?

“However….” His billowing sleeves part to reveal a note in each hand. “Ser Jaime has just informed us that she is not, in fact, with child. It was a rouse to ensure his loyalty because she does not plan to send any troops to the North.”

Jon seems to shake with anger next to her.

“And she has pyromancers in the Guildhall producing wildfire by the ton while the Iron fleet sails to Essos to employ the Golden Company,” Tyrion adds, staring at the ground.

 _No_. She refuses to believe it. “How do you know this information wasn’t sent to lure me into the capital where she’ll be waiting prepared?”

“The writing is Jaime’s and I know my brother, I know he would never—”

“You also said you knew your sister.” Her words are sharp as a scorpion’s sting.

“I have enquired with my birds in Massey’s Hook for any sightings of the Iron fleet sailing east, Your Grace. We should know soon enough,” Varys answers instead.

Had her Hand not looked so ashamed already, Daenerys would have said more to him, broken something or other to get her anger out, but it would do no good to lash out now. She must _think_ , there is no time to waste with theatrics while that false queen wins.

_You're a dragon._

“How long will it take for him to reach Braavos?”

“A fortnight — perhaps more.”

“So we have a fortnight to kill Euron Greyjoy and Cersei Lannister.”

The room is eerily silent, all eyes staring at her as if she is being unreasonable for wanting her enemies dead. Still, she keeps her chin up.

 _Be a dragon_.

“We cannot allow him to reach Braavos, broker a deal with the Iron Bank, and hire the Golden Company, you know we cannot,” she explains. “And we can’t keep underestimating Cersei. She _will_ find out we know about her plans and she will not be happy. It is best to infiltrate the Red Keep when her defenses are low, when she believes us to be fooled by her games.”

The looks of trepidation turn into agreement.

“There is no possibility where Cersei surrenders. If she feels she is losing she would sooner engulf the entire city in green flames than wave a white flag.” Dany pauses, contemplating. “There will be no battle, no siege. Find a way to reach your brother without any ravens being intercepted. If he can weaken King’s Landing’s defenses, we need but ten good men and it will fall within a day.”

The morning after next, they send men in. As they leave on a small, unmarked ship for the River Gate, she leaves on Drogon for the Silence.

~

Thousands of arrows had flown up at her and thousands had bounded off Drogon’s scales. Except for the one that lodged itself into her thigh.

She hadn’t felt it immediately. The thrill of revenge, as charred remains of the Silence littered the Narrow Sea and Euron Greyjoy’s mad laugh blew into the wind with his ashes, was deafening over any other sensation but oh, she feels it now.

Dany had meant to soar closer to the fleet once their captain was dealt with, give them an inspiring speech — something or other to tell them that their lives mustn’t be wasted behind a man with nothing but blind greed, that Yara Greyjoy still lives, a soon-to-be-freed captive at Pyke, and can lead them better than any other — but her vision goes black before a single word can be uttered.

She focuses her last thread of full consciousness on communicating with her dragons, telling them to turn back toward Dragonstone, and holding on for dear life with her entire body pressed against Drogon’s heat. The brilliant blue of the ocean becomes clear for a moment but the black invades her vision again like a toppled bottle of ink. She tries to blink it away, murmuring nonsense, until speckles of blue bloom in the dark. She has never felt flames lick her skin but this is how she imagines it feels, as her entire right leg pulses in pain and hot blood oozes out to soak her leggings.

Perhaps she should apply pressure or snap off the protruding shaft of the arrow and tie a tourniquet or any other sensible thing to stop it from worsening but the fear of plummeting into the sea keeps her hands glued to her son. What is surely a smooth ride feels like trying to stay seated on a wild bull until it all slows to a stop, her grip falling slack despite her efforts and the sound in her head drowning out into nothing.

The world goes black again and when it clears, her son is gone, as is the sea below. No, Dany finds herself in her bed, surrounded by warm furs and wool blankets and — and a little body tucked into her left side. Her neck feels too weak to pick her head up from the pillows to look but she doesn’t really have too. It is none other than Aryanna beside her, half her body laying across Dany’s as she sleeps on her side. Gods, she can barely think straight but her womb clenches and aches, knowing it will never create life like the little one pressed against her.

Her body is too tired to stay awake long enough for her to mourn that future. The darkness pulls her under once more.

When she wakes again, she knows she must fight to stay this time. The milk of the poppy that she’d undoubtedly been given has reduced the blinding pain to a dull throb in her thigh. She knows the wound is deep but the lack of crimson bleeding onto her nightgown assures her it will heal.

Aryanna is still fast asleep, face pressed against the hollow below her sternum. Dany could cry just looking at her, which is simply infuriating because when did she get so weepy?

Before those earlier thoughts poison her mind again, she scans the rest of her bedchamber. The first thing her eyes land upon is Jon, asleep in the armchair by the hearth with his head lolled to the side. If her throat hadn’t felt so hoarse, she might’ve laughed at how similar father and daughter look.

Her gaze shifts to the desk, which is covered in scrolls but even thinking about the war makes her head throb. She turns her neck to look to the bedside table next. Linens and jars and vials and — ah, water!

Too hastily, her hand reaches out for a glass but her lack of coordination sends it clanging against the stone floor, loud enough to wake Jon but not Aryanna.

He’s standing in an instant as if preparing himself for some fight, until he registers where he is. His eyes meet hers, visibly softening with relief. When he sees Aryanna, he bounds closer, pushing back a few stray curls. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know when she left the chair to— is she hurtin’ you?”

He moves to lift the girl from her side but, almost pained by the thought, Dany shoots her hand out to stop him. “I’m fine, Jon.” Her voice is barely a whisper but each syllable still feels like coarse sand against her throat.

Dany motions for the water and he quickly moves to oblige. She tries to sit up but it immediately sends a shock of agony from her wound, causing her to whimper pathetically.

“Let me.” A firm hand is on her back before her mind has a chance to catch up, while the other stacks the pillows together so she can lean back against them.

She’s almost glad that her voice isn’t working because her thanks would have come out as a stammered mess.

Jon hands her a glass from which she takes deep gulps, feeling as if she’s in the damned Red Waste again.

He chuckles quietly beside her. “Slow down, you don’t want it all comin’ back up,” he says, though he still refills the glass when she raises it up for more.

“How long have I been out?”

“You weren’t gone long, only got back this morning, but it’s dusk now,” he says, moving to sit lower on the bed, brushing the hair off Aryanna’s face. “Your Dothraki brought in some healer. Ser Jorah translated for me, said the arrow had just missed an important artery that—” He shakes his head, as if unable to finish the thought.

 _Had he inquired about me?_ Suddenly his pale skin flushes pink and she stupidly worries she asked the question aloud.

“She hasn’t slept since you left so she’s knocked out proper right now. Once you returned, she wanted to come to see you and refused to leave until you’d woken.” He nods to Aryanna but something tells her that that isn’t the only reason why he’s here.

Quickly, she changes the topic. “What news of the capital? Cersei…?”

He doesn’t say anything except that Cersei Lannister is dead.

The words don’t even sound real to her. _All you’ve ever wanted since you were old enough to want._ She would be naive to rejoice. Even if his tone hadn’t clued at there being bad news as well, there is too much left to do for this to be considered a victory.

“I will have the ships readied and the men prepared. Send all the dragonglass mined so far so the North can begin to arm itself,” Dany says, voice controlled and confident. “We shall depart once matters of food stores and supplies are settled. Your Grace.”

Jon barks out a short laugh at that, making her foolish heart swell with pride. “You sure you didn’t hit your head on that dragon too?”

She shakes her head, smiling. “If we’re to destroy the Night King and his army, we must do it together, as equals.”

He looks moved by her words, taking a deep breath he’s probably been holding in since the first time she told him to bend the knee. But he surprises her then. “The North will be yours before the war is done, Daenerys. The Northern lords, they’ll come to see what I see. I know it.”

“And what do you see?”

His _eyes —_  dark as storm clouds, swimming with something so chasmic she can hardly comprehend it. _Can it be love_?

The realization strikes her like a bolt to the heart and the pain resounding from her chest is immeasurably worse than that from any wound. She fights the pressure behind her eyes threatening to make them well and weep, shaking her head almost imperceptibly.

He tries to hide it, tries so hard to keep his hurt masked, but she sees it anyway. Another bolt.

“I should go. I— I am glad you’re well.”

And before she can apologize, for them not being just man and woman, for not being able to love freely, for whatever cruel gods destined them for this, he picks up Aryanna and is gone from her chambers.

~

That’s the last she sees of Jon in their time on the island.

The healer, an elderly former member of the _Dosh Khaleen_ named Terinni, enters shortly after to see to the wound. It’s a nasty, gaping thing, cutting deep into her thigh. She thinks it unwise to stitch it up before the inside heals up nicely and so she applies something green that stings like salt, then honey to soothe the pain and prevent it from festering.

Her next visitor is Missandei. Her friend hugs her close, fretting over the wound until Dany lays a gentling hand on her cheek. She keeps her company for the rest of the night, dining with her to keep the loneliness at bay and sleeping beside her in case she needs anything. In the morning, she helps her wash while humming some song from some land Dany doesn’t know. Missandei is much happier these days. With Grey Worm returned to her safely, her shy smile never fades.

Soon after she leaves, Tyrion wordlessly steps into her bedchamber, looking the worse for wear.

He tells her about Cersei’s fall.

They sent in four Unsullied, pale enough to pass as Westerosi, dressed in the golden cloaks of the guards that patrol the city. Each was paired with a real member of the City Watch that Ser Jaime deemed trustworthy for they knew the secret passageways and inner workings of the keep.

Despite their efforts, however, Cersei’s eyes and ears, hidden in every corner of the city, still managed to catch their plan.

It was all working out perfectly — too perfectly. They were led into the throne room by intentionally placed whispers but all that waited for them was green flames.

Wildfire obliterated the throne of her ancestors, blew apart the ancient ceiling and left the walls crumbling. The thousand swords that made up the throne, forged for Aegon the Conqueror by Balerion’s own fire, now reduced to meaningless scraps of iron. Cersei’s message was clear enough.

It killed their men, the lords come to court, and the mob of starved rioters just outside, five hundred at the least though it’s impossible to count casualties when they’re blown into bits by an explosion of that magnitude.

All while Cersei Lannister remained untouched and unbothered, tucked away in the royal apartments.

Or that is what everyone presumed. Only later did word get out that her body had been found in her bed, strangled it seemed, and Ser Jaime’s was found in the gardens down below, twisted and broken from the fall just as King Tommen’s had been. Kingslayer, kinslayer, hero.

“I’m so sorry, Tyrion.” It’s not often Dany calls him by his first name but she hopes to make him realize this is more than just politics and war. She imagines it was excruciating enough to be stretched between loyalty to his family and loyalty to her but _this_ is a different kind of pain. It strikes her that he is now the last lion, just as she is the last dragon. What a pair they make.

His lips purse and his bearded chin wobbles. He only shakes his head, staring down into his lap trying desperately to regain his composure.

“Cersei has been trying to have me killed since the day I was born. Her only redeemable quality died long ago with her children,” he says eventually. “Jaime, however….”

Wordlessly, Daenerys reaches for the flagon of wine on her bedside table and passes it to him. He raises the whole thing to his mouth, takes a healthy sip, sets it down, changes his mind, takes another.

“He was never cruel to me in the way that the rest of my family was. His only real fault was loving Cersei.” He smiles for a moment, saying, “You know, when we were growing up, we—” but the memory becomes too painful to recount and so he tips the wine back once more.

Dany rubs his shoulder sympathetically, feeling his grief as if it were her own.

Tyrion clears his throat, seeking a change of subject, some work to distract himself, in simply saying, “The throne room and the Lannister banners.“

“All of that can be dealt with later. For now, we must focus on repressing the chaos within the smallfolk. The next shipment of food from Meereen will be sent to King’s Landing. Empty the Red Keep’s stores of all that can be spared. Their minds have been poisoned by rumors but they mustn’t see us as the enemy. Besides, winter is here and it is unlikely any of them will survive with the way food is being distributed now.”

 _Winter is here_. She even sounds like Jon now.

Tyrion nods, glad for something to do. He stoops to bow and depart but Dany stops him.

“Jon Snow…” she says, not quite knowing what it is she feels or wants to say, though her Hand did always clear her mind, helping her leave behind girlish thoughts to see her priorities.

He only makes matters worse, however, by telling her, “When you landed, he was the one to come get you off of Drogon.”

“He climbed onto Drogon? And Drogon let him?”

“Without protest,” he says with a frown. “Perhaps his mother had some Valyrian blood.”

She sucks on her bottom lip, trying to recall all that Jon has said about his mother. No, Ned Stark took that secret to the grave, it seems.

“He’s in love with you.”

The words slice through her thoughts but she can’t play oblivious, not to Tyrion. “I know.” Still, admitting it out loud makes her heart bob up into her throat as it closes up.

“What stops you?”

She refrains from scoffing. “What stops me? Let’s see. For one, the Northmen will never be able to see past this, they’ll call me a temptress and I’ll never earn their loyalty. And I can’t have him look weak in front of his people either, he tells me they’re a stubborn lot. And he’s not some Daario, I haven’t the strength to bed him then discard him but I can’t just as well ask him to abandon his home, his title, to come south with me when the war is won. And….” Her voice breaks, strained from having said all that in one breath and tight with emotion. “He’s so _good_ , Tyrion, he’s an honorable man, an incredible father, yet I cannot give him… I cannot deserve him.”

Through her own unshed tears, she sees Tyrion’s eyes well too, a rare display of empathy toward her that he tries to hide.

“This is the only time you’ll ever hear me say this,” he starts. “You are thinking too far ahead. Still, I’m not going to lie to you. It will be hard, very hard, getting the Northerners to bend but we can play this the right way if need be. It’s a good match. If you want to break the wheel of the highborn crushing the lowborn, marrying a Snow would be an excellent start. It’s a promise for change, it sparks hope.” He takes a deep breath, tapping the wine holder.

 _Marriage_. As a queen, it’s her job to think for the long term but this future, where she marries not only for politics but for _love_ as well, seems far from the realms of her reality.

Finally, he says, “I do not believe any of the bloody gods could ever fashion anyone truly worthy of you, Daenerys Stormborn, but Jon Snow… he is not like everyone else.”

~

“ _Dany_.”

Jon breathes her name against her lips and she’s lost.

Her nails dig into the flesh of his back, knees clamped around his waist as the strained coil in her belly snaps. She can barely hear herself panting and whining unintelligible nonsense over the rush in her ears as each merciless thrust overwhelms her senses with ecstasy. She tightens around him, drawing a deep, shuddering breath of his own as his impassioned pace falters.

And suddenly he’s gone from within her and she doesn’t understand what’s happening until he takes himself in hand and his hot seed pools on her belly.

Dany’s jumbled mess of a brain is spent in trying to catch her breath and make the stars disappear from her vision so she doesn’t think on it until he collapses beside her and blindly grabs at the bedside table for one of the clean linen bandages meant for her nearly healed wound. Gentle hands wipe her navel clean then see to the sticky juices on her inner thighs.

_Oh._

She must look as pained as she feels because when he tosses the cloth behind him, pulls the furs over them, and looks up, it’s with worry and concern. “Fuck. Did I hurt you? Or your leg, did I—”

“No, no,” she whispers, turning her leaden body to the side to face him. Her hands reach up to cup his face and a thumb glides over each cheek, easing away the tension. “No, Jon, you were….” She can’t even finish the sentence without a rosy flush blooming across her face though she was never so modest in the first place. She had dreamt of what her broody, reserved king would be like, feel like, but none of her fantasies came close to the man she was met with when she knocked upon his door. Just the memory of it has her wanting him again but his searching eyes remind her of her overbearing guilt. “I should have told you. I don’t know why I didn’t tell you. I’m a coward.”

“Daenerys.”

“You didn’t have to pull out when you… I— I cannot have children, Jon.” She hates that her voice comes out as a quiet rasp, that this truth still has so much power over her.

He surprises her when his brows furrow and he asks, “Who told you that?”

“The witch who murdered my husband.” Mirri Maz Duur had listed it among a number of other impossibilities, her words still clear in Dany’s head. _When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east. When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves. When your womb quickens again, and you bear a living child._

“Has it occurred to you she might not have been a reliable source of information,” he says, the corners of his lips twitching.

She scoffs unbelievingly, laying a soft punch to his shoulder as she tries not to let his humor get to her. “Stop it. It’s true. I had a lover back in Meereen, I invited him into my bed more times than I can remember-” Jon grimaces, “and nothing came from it.”

“Then perhaps it was him.”

“Jon.” As much as she tries to play along to his lightness on this matter, her heart still cracks slowly.

“Alright. I’m sorry. Know that I don’t believe any witch’s word but also know I already have more children than I ever saw myself havin’. I vowed to never father a child, not for the bloody Watch but because I didn’t want to subject anyone else to a life with the surname Snow. I love Aryanna more than anything but I never expected _any_ of this for me. Do you understand?”

She shuffles closer, laying a kiss to the angry scar over his heart in response — she hasn’t pushed him about the wounds that litter his torso, thinking he will tell when he is ready.

He pulls her close, strong arms shielding her from the world as soft lips press against her crown. His skin is hot like her own but she only burrows deeper into the embrace.

Dany wants to argue, wants to say he deserves twenty more little babes and nothing but happiness and tranquillity until the end of his days, a life so different from the one he would have with her… but she doesn’t. Instead, her eyes droop shut and the only sound in the stateroom is the sea splashing against the ship’s hull.

Time passes languidly in repose until Jon, sounding so very vulnerable, asks, “What changed your mind, Daenerys?”

“I told my fears to fuck off,” she answers truthfully, the crude words thrilling on her tongue.

She feels his chest rumble with a rare laugh.

“And please. Call me Dany.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi again!  
> i hope the wait wasn't too long for this chapter and that you guys liked it! this story is so much fun to write so i was very very happy with everyone's response to the last chapter. let me know what you think about this one too please!!
> 
>  
> 
> also, if anyone wasn't sure which dress i was talking about in the dinner scene with just jon and dany, it was this one: https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2Foriginals%2F3e%2Fe1%2F96%2F3ee19607e98479891d4f8f9c97256303.jpg&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F13792342592895844%2F&docid=b38QbQ-vJpVXKM&tbnid=zl1ZSOp0mC7kTM%3A&vet=1&w=1332&h=948&source=sh%2Fx%2Fim

**Author's Note:**

> helloooooo!  
> i know many of you badly want updates for my multi-chapter works but this idea just refused to leave my head and i couldn't focus on anything else. it was a much needed break, to be honest.  
> expect this to only have one or two more chapters, because they are quite long.  
> also, the timeline and specific details of the history and stuff are not so accurate but hey, this was for fun so let's ignore that, shall we?  
> overall, i hope you enjoyed it!! please let me know!  
> the next chapter may or may not be from dany's pov ;)


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